I am having this really strong sense of deja vu when I write this, but I simply must write more about this whole China world power farce. I know I have written about this earlier, but then again, this is not a one-off episode to be forgotten among the thousands of other events making headlines every day.
I ask a few simple questions to anybody who is interested - what are the foundations on which modern society is built?
I don't mean the physical foundations, but more on the lines of the way the modern human being lives, or at least strives to live. The basic tenet of modern society I would assume is freedom of the individual, freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, all of which are missing in China which aims to be the next superpower in the world. Now my question is - how? Through fear? Through intimidation? Through money?
Unfortunately, China seems to be employing all three with gusto, especially the last one. China has been impressing small nations in Asia, Africa and the Americas with its promise of a great China-led manufacturing revolution in their respective nations, and big promises of aid and investment. Their foreign affairs seem scarily meticulous, planned, and unemotional, thus adding to the discomfiture of ALL.
I write all in capital because certainly China's neighbors are looking uneasily over their shoulders perhaps expecting China to jump over their sovereign land claiming it to be there own. China and Vietnam fought many years ago, and has since kept control of the Spratley archipelago in the South China Sea, taken from the Vietnamese. Already the Chinese have taken for granted that the South China Sea is their own and nobody elses.
Similarly, after decades of self-imposed refusal to rearm itself, Japan is finally considering to begin rearming itself, given the potential danger of conflict with the newly belligerent China. Of course the USA, still the lone superpower has a huge stake in this decision, but it needs all the help it can get when China will knock at its door to ask for a share in global control. I am fairly certain its going to happen - China asking for the reins, but I do not think anybody can foresee the outcome.
Do I even need to mention China's belligerence with India, which i am fairly certain it considers a state so soft that it can do whatever it pleases, and say the nicest things to our leaders' faces. Stapling of visas to Indians from Arunachal Pradesh, denying a visa to an Army Officer who had served there, and other such Chinese tomfoolery certainly seems very calculated and premeditated.
In Africa, both India and China are trying hard to win the hearts and minds of African people and their governments. Perhaps both are being selfish and driven more by the resources in Africa than anything else, but even then, there seems to be more resentment against the Chinese presence than the Indian presence. India has had longstanding ties with Africa, and has built schools, hospitals there, and shared knowledge. China has simply given lots of aid, and taken over African resources.
The point I am trying to make in the end is that can China claim to be a world power through intimidation and bullying? The USA is a bully, and dozens of small nations across the globe have suffered their belligerence, but in the modern world, minds are won through soft power. Hollywood, rock music and fast food are America's weapons to win new friends. Unfortunately, I think the Chinese society is all but dead inside, and the Chinese leadership are driven by their own visions of dominating the world with money and brute force if need be. It all used to happen in the medieval eras, but I highly doubt the chances of it happening anymore.
In today's free world, the power of the press, the power of information are unstoppable, and if any government thinks it can control it to its own ends, I think its only kidding itself. China was ready to take on the Nobel Prize Committee for awarding the Nobel Prize for Peace to a dissident Liu Xiaobo, arresting his family (he was already under arrest), and threatening Sweden on trade. This episode probably made the Chinese public, and the rest of the world, more aware of who Liu Xiaobo is, and why he has won the prize!
This was reported in the BBC, and its so true:
Copyright: AP
I ask a few simple questions to anybody who is interested - what are the foundations on which modern society is built?
I don't mean the physical foundations, but more on the lines of the way the modern human being lives, or at least strives to live. The basic tenet of modern society I would assume is freedom of the individual, freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, all of which are missing in China which aims to be the next superpower in the world. Now my question is - how? Through fear? Through intimidation? Through money?
Unfortunately, China seems to be employing all three with gusto, especially the last one. China has been impressing small nations in Asia, Africa and the Americas with its promise of a great China-led manufacturing revolution in their respective nations, and big promises of aid and investment. Their foreign affairs seem scarily meticulous, planned, and unemotional, thus adding to the discomfiture of ALL.
I write all in capital because certainly China's neighbors are looking uneasily over their shoulders perhaps expecting China to jump over their sovereign land claiming it to be there own. China and Vietnam fought many years ago, and has since kept control of the Spratley archipelago in the South China Sea, taken from the Vietnamese. Already the Chinese have taken for granted that the South China Sea is their own and nobody elses.
Similarly, after decades of self-imposed refusal to rearm itself, Japan is finally considering to begin rearming itself, given the potential danger of conflict with the newly belligerent China. Of course the USA, still the lone superpower has a huge stake in this decision, but it needs all the help it can get when China will knock at its door to ask for a share in global control. I am fairly certain its going to happen - China asking for the reins, but I do not think anybody can foresee the outcome.
Do I even need to mention China's belligerence with India, which i am fairly certain it considers a state so soft that it can do whatever it pleases, and say the nicest things to our leaders' faces. Stapling of visas to Indians from Arunachal Pradesh, denying a visa to an Army Officer who had served there, and other such Chinese tomfoolery certainly seems very calculated and premeditated.
In Africa, both India and China are trying hard to win the hearts and minds of African people and their governments. Perhaps both are being selfish and driven more by the resources in Africa than anything else, but even then, there seems to be more resentment against the Chinese presence than the Indian presence. India has had longstanding ties with Africa, and has built schools, hospitals there, and shared knowledge. China has simply given lots of aid, and taken over African resources.
The point I am trying to make in the end is that can China claim to be a world power through intimidation and bullying? The USA is a bully, and dozens of small nations across the globe have suffered their belligerence, but in the modern world, minds are won through soft power. Hollywood, rock music and fast food are America's weapons to win new friends. Unfortunately, I think the Chinese society is all but dead inside, and the Chinese leadership are driven by their own visions of dominating the world with money and brute force if need be. It all used to happen in the medieval eras, but I highly doubt the chances of it happening anymore.
In today's free world, the power of the press, the power of information are unstoppable, and if any government thinks it can control it to its own ends, I think its only kidding itself. China was ready to take on the Nobel Prize Committee for awarding the Nobel Prize for Peace to a dissident Liu Xiaobo, arresting his family (he was already under arrest), and threatening Sweden on trade. This episode probably made the Chinese public, and the rest of the world, more aware of who Liu Xiaobo is, and why he has won the prize!
This was reported in the BBC, and its so true:
If it had not made such a huge fuss about the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu Xiaobo, the world's press would not have come to Oslo in such large numbers to report on the ceremony.
And if China had not tried to strong-arm countries with diplomatic representation in Norway and persuade them not to send their ambassadors to the ceremony, then it would not have got into a contest with Europe and the United States - something it was never going to win.
The symbolism of the empty chair was pretty damaging.
The only regimes that have imposed it on the Nobel Prize Committee in the past have been of a kind which China would not want to be compared with: Nazi Germany, the old Soviet Union, Poland under martial law, Burma.
Copyright: AP
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