text:
China was a civilisation concerned on economic development within its borders; the barbarians only knew how to to wage war and occupy.
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China was a civilisation concerned on economic development within its borders; the barbarians only knew how to to wage war and occupy.
I read this book in a single 8-hour sitting. I recommend it, but it will make uncomfortable reading for those living around the South and East China Seas.
A point that the author makes, which this reviewer doesn't mention, is that the anti-China alliance might use trade (or rather its interruption) as a weapon:
"Because China's continuing rise ultimately threatens the very independence of its neighbors, and even of its present peers, it will inevitably be resisted by geo-economic means - that is, by strategically motivated as opposed to merely protectionist trade barriers, investment prohibitions, more extensive technology denials, and even restrictions on raw material exports to China if its misconduct can provide a sufficient excuse for that almost warlike act." - Luttwak, Page 42
What implications would such an embargo have on trade through the Malacca and Sunda straits?
The author also muses on the effect China's perceived belligerence might have on the attitude of China's adversaries toward their ethnic Chinese minorities - uncomfortable reading for those groups in Thailand, Phillipines, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Not to put too fine a point on it, Luttwak's concludes that the rise of China will likely result in war. The arguments he uses to reach this conclusion are, unfortunately, convincing.
[Fun with 16th, 07:16
I read this book in a single 8-hour sitting. I recommend it, but it will make uncomfortable reading for those living around the South and East China Seas.
A point that the author makes, which this reviewer doesn't mention, is that the anti-China alliance might use trade (or rather its interruption) as a weapon:
"Because China's continuing rise ultimately threatens the very independence of its neighbors, and even of its present peers, it will inevitably be resisted by geo-economic means - that is, by strategically motivated as opposed to merely protectionist trade barriers, investment prohibitions, more extensive technology denials, and even restrictions on raw material exports to China if its misconduct can provide a sufficient excuse for that almost warlike act." - Luttwak, Page 42
What implications would such an embargo have on trade through the Malacca and Sunda straits?
The author also muses on the effect China's perceived belligerence might have on the attitude of China's adversaries toward their ethnic Chinese minorities - uncomfortable reading for those groups in Thailand, Phillipines, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Not to put too fine a point on it, Luttwak's concludes that the rise of China will likely result in war. The arguments he uses to reach this conclusion are, unfortunately, convincing.]
Convincing??? THAT's a very funny conclusion from some Indian poster. Of course, India has undertaken "protectionist trade barriers, investment prohibitions, more extensive technology denials, and even restrictions on raw material exports to China" ever since the border war between the 2 countries. So, how much damage has that done to China? Last time I check, the India-China trade has ballooned-- In China's favour. ;-D, ;-D, ;-D
More fun but no fruit for " "protectionist trade barriers, investment prohibitions, more extensive technology denials, and even restrictions on raw material exports to China":
Marx is my god and communism is only true religion! CCP is opium of the Masses! Problem that you think CCP is you god. I go back to Marx direct for my religion. I do'nt axcept Reformation Marxism that has CCP gangster in my life everywhere. CCP is heresy on Marx. CCP is twisted Russianism that Mao suckled from Stalin. Xiāngbalǎo Communist people will restore Marx Thought like in his holy book. Xiāngbalǎo Communist restore original socialism, remove city boy dictator from the party, power to the proletariat. Peoples Republic for the People, not CCP. Why you still have Houkou? You try to control us Xiāngbalǎo Communist like South Africa apartheid! You try keep us in Bantustan, but you want our worker labor and peasant food supply to city. But can we get educate? No! You city boy hold us down. You bring on 18th Brumaire of Xi Jinping!
I suppose the author doesn't realize that it's not just the big bad scary PRC that has interests in the South China Sea. Taiwan also claims the islets there as part of China. Arrogant blowhards in the West do not seem to be aware of the fact that 60 million Chinese people live outside of China, with a combined wealth and GDP that would rank fourth and fifth in the world, respectively.
His notion that China faces diplomatic blowback for asserting its natural and historical rights to the Spratlys and other islets goes both ways. Many Taiwanese and Overseas Chinese find common cause with the PRC when certain revisionist nations are emboldened by US aggression, not to mention the fact that China moves closer to Russia when the land-grabbers get too uppity.
Well the book seems to be focused on the PRC, or at least that is the impression I got from articles.
I think anyone who has travelled or read up a bit about South East Asia would be aware of the emigrant communities of Chinese (like say while passing through Singapore for starters, or coming across old stories about various waves of boat people from Vietnam).
So do you anticipate a (temporary) alignment between Taiwan and the PRC in pushing for recognition of the nine line claim?
Do you envision a fifth column of overseas Chinese lobbying their countries of residence to recognize the nine line claim?
AS for countries in the region other than the PRC and Taiwan, they may not view the claims as "natural and historical rights" (sounds all very 19th century to be honest).
I like the reference to Russia. Possibly China will move closer, it is in its interest from an energy and natural resource perspective.
However, Russia was one of the biggest land grabbers, in compelling China to give up claims on Mongolia, and in attempting to seize Manchuria in all but name under the Czars, as well as formally annexing territories of the Manchus (present day Primorsky Krai and a good chunk of Khabarovsk Krai, etc.).
That's why US is trying to "pivot" in ASEAN countries (except for Cambodia, ruled by a "Chinese stooge"). Relying too much on Taiwan as a buffer against Communist China is problematical, to say the least. There are simply too many spies (or ties to the "Mainland", if I want to put it mildly!) and double-agents in Taiwan and US realises that. The Cold War is over and its not simply Communism against Capitalism anymore!
It's true what you say about the "ethnocentric loyalty" of expatriate Chinese community to the "Great Han Civilisation" I know that from living near Vancouver!
Russians did teach Chinese how to dance Ballet (which some younger Chinese seem to believe was invented in China 3000 years ago! the classical Peking Opera: Xia against Shang(bad guys) against Zhou(good guys) etc. was very different and was performed without Ballet leaps lol)
In any case, China still needs the "help" of the greedy Wall Street Capitalist Corporations to keep the "Great Economic Leapfrog Forward" going (7% would be quite alright, no?)
"Taiwan also claims the islets there as part of China"
Taiwan claims the Spratlys for itself. Nothing about the airport Taiwan has there says anything about the PRC and neither does the Taiwanese Air Force that is stationed there.
Looking at the relationship between the two Koreas makes me wonder if ethnic ties between divided nations are really as strong as you're suggesting they are.
"..Russia was one of the biggest land grabbers, in compelling China to give up claims on Mongolia, and in attempting to seize Manchuria in all but name under the Czars..."
You are absolutely right and, moreover, Stalin's appetite for Manchuria and other parts of China was more than amply demonstrated in August 1945 when the Soviets attempted another land grab under a pretext of an attack on the Japanese forces. That Soviet attack came way too late to make any difference, - American atom bombing of Hiroshima and Nagassaki forced Japan's unconditional surrender. But the Russian saw both material gains (dismantled industrial assets in Manchuria) and political influence by being one of the victors. The Chinese have not forgotten how difficult it was to have Moscow withdraw its occupational forces from the Chinese territory.
This interesting commentary, from a reputable source, about the scope of Russian looting of Manchuria in 1945-46 says it all:
"...the Russians were selective in their removals. They appear, however, to have wantonly destroyed a certain amount of what they did not, or could not, take away, while by the removal of key parts they paralysed much of the equipment which they left intact. The most comprehensive estimate of the effect upon the Manchurian industrial structure was that made by Mr Edwin Pauley, the United States Reparations Commissioner, who paid a visit to Manchuria in June 1946, and submitted a Report to President Truman. The Report states that 'the Soviets did not take everything. They concentrated on certain categories of supplies, machinery and equipment. In addition to taking stockpiles and certain complete industrial installations, the Soviets took by far the larger part of all functioning power-generating and transforming equipment, electric motors, experimental plants, laboratories and hospitals. In machine-tools, they took only the newest and best, leaving antiquated tools behind.'
Well the Soviets also received rights to military bases in Manchuria, such as air stations, but also a naval station or two in the south (Lushun?).
Moreover, they regained some control of certain railroads across Manchuria (Eastern Chinese Railroad? Maybe South Manchuria Railroad too?).
Some say that when the Soviet armies showed up near the door gate of Japan, Japan rushed to surrender to US to avert Soviet's invasion on her hinterland. The Japanese knew clearly how the Soviets would treat them like that shown in the subsequent treatment of the Japanese POW in the gulags in Siberia: 200k of the captives were just simply gone forever. On comparison, Uncle Sam was like a Santa Claus to the Japanese.
Well Manchuria is not exactly the door gate of Japan.
Seoul was still Japanese on August 15th (my mother inlaw was living at the Japanese base of Itaewan there at the time), so not sure the Soviets had progressed too far down the Korean penninsula.
There were operations against Karafuto and the Kurils, to the north, but these continued after August 15, into September. So don't know how well positioned/prepare the Soviets were for an invasion of Hokkaido. The defenses up north were likely lighter since the Japanese had conducted a huge build up in Kyushu in (correct) anticipation of US invasion plans.
The big thing about the Soviet invasion was that now there was another source of massive, but experienced manpower to threaten Japans armies on the Asian continent, both the depleted Kwangtung army in Manchuria and Japanese forces spread across the eastern seaboard of China proper.
The Japanese possibly viewed the Soviets as tougher than many of the many western armies, having been thrashed by them in 1939, and having had observers in Germany up to the end of the European conflict.
Really made any hopes of fighting a war of attrition with the mainland territories untenable for all but the most militaristic Japanese officers (which there were a few of).
You might have forgotten that the Soviets had started invading Japan in the northern islands (south of Sakhalin and Kuril). Should Japan have deferred the decision to surrender, the Soviets might have reached further south and carved up the hinterland of Japan. That's why Japan was so eager to surrender to US, the earlier the better. The Soviets were much more hostile and brutal than the GIs.
You can't have diplomatic, economic, and military preeminence? What about the United States? Or is Luttwak's book a eulogy for the US as well?
The United States doesn't have diplomatic pre-eminence since Iraq 2003.
I hit the recommend for the post because the US did do a heck of a job blowing political capital carelessly.
I think the US still enjoys a situation of diplomatic primus intra pares though, however much by the skin of its teeth.
To Slide4180, its not often that one gets through WWI, WWII and an unique cold war relatively intact. So part of the diplomatic equation is the result of accidents of history.
This with a relatively unsophisticated, parochial bunch (granted the foreign policy establishments, and schools on diplomacy at Georgetown and Tufts may disagree).
And the US had some decent diplomatic successes to back its standing and/or make up for its deficiencies.
I think the US will have to be a heck lot more careful going forward. I mentioned in other posts, and don't want to sound reptitious, but feel the US needs to: Speak softly, carry a big (economical) stick, and keep a low profile
Take Syria - maybe the Russians are now reading the situation right now, and a deal should be pushed? Not crazy, considering say the situations and compromises back in the day with the Yom Kippur war. Probably better than gas warfare and Al Qaeda emirates of terror cropping up like cancer tumors....
"the US still enjoys a situation of diplomatic primus intra pares"
I think the jury is out on that. Iraq was such a monumental cock-up that many who were previously well-disposed towards the US are now wondering.
The US's problem is the neocons, represented by Bush Jr, Rumsfeld, Rice, Cheyney, the NRA, AIPAC, Sarah Palin and other such hillbillies.
Many who remember the Marshall Plan and President Kennedy will wonder if America is losing it's soul.
It is encouraging that Obama has won a second term and Sarah Palin invites almost universal scorn, but it seems there is a struggle within the US between conservatives (read neocons) and liberals occupying opposite ends of the political spectrum.
This polarisation results in political stand-offs such as the fiscal cliff, which (again) threaten to damage the world economy.
America is in flux. I hope the liberals win out, or we are in trouble.
It is simplistic to characterize present debates as conservative vs liberal.
It seems more like the far right, comprising of various neocons, Neo-John Bircher types, a weird strain of both royalism and anarchist libertarianism and what not that accumulated under the TEA party are propagandizing, and acting against the interests of everyone else.
Seems the real conservatives, and moderate wings of the Republican party have let themselve be pushed around by the fringe.
Conversely, seems that independents and centrists stand with traditional liberals and what passes for center left in the states on a number of issues:
Like its 50 to 60% in favor of leaving medicare alone (something the news seems to forget)
It is 60% or so that want tax increases for higher tax brackets
Something like 60 to 70%, or more that don't want to be in Afghanistan or bomb Iran, or get in any other conflicts.
I am a Republican but the characterization of the stand-offs and polarizations are misleading, and kind of veil the fact that a small minority of political interests are really gumming things up (creating manufactured crises like the debt ceiling for example).
Part of it stems from laziness of the media, as well as pretense to "give each side a chance to tell its story" when in fact, a majority if not a silent supermajority are for one side of a set of issues, versus a loud minority (or set of minority interests).
As for US diplomacy, why is the US getting pulled into Syrian affairs? Why was it dragged into Libya? Who of the outside powers had more clout during the Arab Spring? I think it is clear the US is primus intra pares still. This level of influence to some degree manifests across many major regions too (South America, the Pacific, etc.).
Now is the US skillful in diplomacy? I think that is an open question. If the verdict is, not so much, I wouldn't be surprised since the country at the end of the day is a it insular.
Well Mr Luttwak, in another 5 years, 10 years at the most, you would know whether you are right or wrong. The flaw in your argument is that you treat sundries and all alike. Any 3rd rate marketing student will tell you that culture is most important in determining the outcome of a population event. Well you are no 3rd rate marketing student, so you are not to blame for making Mayan forecast like the end of the world on Dec 21, 2012. Just wait...sostenuto.
has it occurred to you that this book is full of narrow minded craps and malices by a simple read of this TE review?
it is not worthy unless you are in it for the bashing too.
Actually the writer of the review left out many of the authors qualifications. Since the Economist likes to bash China that is expected.
something like two wrongs made the book sounding at lot worse?
if you ask me, I won't touch the book period.
"..I won't touch the book period"
Hmm.., are you planning to write your own ?
Based on the article (I have NOT read this book), it seems as if Mr. Luttwak's main argument essentially boils down to two key "logical" elements:
1) As China becomes more economically successful, it will look to increase its military and diplomatic power in the hopes of becoming a more significant geopolitical force.
2) In response to China's rising influence, other regional and global powers will, in the name of self-interest, seek to curb China's increasing clout. Since military action is effectively unfeasible, this response will necessarily come via an economic channel, slowing China's growth and choking its ambitions to become a world superpower.
As natural as these arguments may seem, there is definite reason to doubt Mr. Luttwak's logic. Most notably, Mr. Luttwak's argument is predicated on the assumption that China's rivals will see more benefit in curbing China's influence than in continuing to support its economy. This hypothesis, however, does not consider the potential negative economic reactions other countries will suffer by choosing NOT to engage with China. Over the past decade, China has cemented itself as a source of cheap, efficient labor; many of the worlds largest companies, such as Apple, thus rely on Chinese manufacturing. In addition, China has effectively "hedged" itself by buying foreign sovereign debt in large quantities, propping up the economies of its would-be rivals. Many of those who would therefore seek to undermine China's economy are "handcuffed," and unable to do so effectively.
As a former military adviser, it is understandable that Mr. Luttwak would believe that military threats, such as that of a more diplomatically aggressive China, warrant extreme responses. However, to those with a more rounded worldview, it seems that there are many further factors that need to be considered. This does NOT mean that China lacks serious political and economic risks--there are several concerns on the sustainability of China's growth. However, it seems like the height of audacity for one who is "no-China expert," to comment on the nature of these risks and the chances of them actualizing.
Finally, Mr. Luttwak's arguments are nothing new. In fact, throughout history, established powers have always sought to maintain the status quo, and therefore undermine the rise of growing states. Such action, however, has rarely succeeded in completely curbing the rise of these new world powers, and its doubtful that it will work this time, with China.
Its funny how arrogant people are to comment on what Mr. Luttwak has to say through a one page book review. The writer of the book review omitted alot of qualifications made by Mr. Luttwak.
You are right...I realize my comment above may seem preliminary and even arrogant given that I have not read the book and have based my responses off the limited information provided in the article. I actually do look forward to reading the book and learning more about Mr. Luttwak's views.
I have read the book, and will respond to your points:
"This hypothesis, however, does not consider the potential negative economic reactions other countries will suffer by choosing NOT to engage with China"
Luttwak contends that in the face of what appears to be an increasingly aggressive China (he quotes incidents at the Spratlys, Senkakus and Arunachal Pradesh), China's opponents have formed an anti-China alliance supported by the US. Since China is a nuclear-armed state, the anti-China alliance will only resort to military measure as a last resort, but since the threat (as they see it) must be reduced somehow, they will seek to do so by economic means (embargoes, trade barriers etc).
"throughout history, established powers have always sought to maintain the status quo, and therefore undermine the rise of growing states. Such action, however, has rarely succeeded in completely curbing the rise of these new world powers"
I don't know about that. The British and allies defeated Germany in 1918 and subjected it to crippling reparations. The US and her allies destroyed Germany again in 1945, and it was cut in half for the next half-century. The US collapsed the Soviet Union in 1989, and it remains a hollow shell of its former self. The US obliterated Japan in 1945 and it is only now re-arming...to counter China's perceived aggression, strangely enough.
I haven't had a chance to read the book but I suspect people here and the author seriously over subscribe to how much Chinese superiority complex clouds their strategic thinking. I think you will find that the Chinese are quite adept at being pragmatic, to awe and be meek and submissive as expedience requires. Look at what Deng Xiaoping did after '79 or Mao in '71. They both made u-turns on their ideology for the sake of pragmatism. Furthermore I think the recent hullabolla about the U.S. pviot and containment has been seriously overestimated.
There is no U.S. containment policy against China and I am not sure if the Chinese really believe their own propaganda that there is. What is really happening is that the small and middle states in East Asia are taking advantage of strategic competition between U.S. and China to effect the maximum benefit from both sides. For instance, why enter into a bilateral negotiation with China over South China Sea when you can involve the U.S. and maybe strike a better deal with China further down the line? Just because there is linkage amongst states with opposing claims to China's does not imply any sort of grand balancing coalition. The devil is in the details, not what you read on BBC.
Also, I do not see recent Chinese "aggression" as anything new or out of the norm. First of all these claims that China has, the Diaoyu islands, and the South China Sea are long standing. China is not going to start a shooting a war over any of them. It may apply calculated political and economic pressure to improve its bargaining position but that is expected of any rising power.
Finally the big reason why no balancing coalition could occur is that China is extremely intertwined economically and culturally with all the would be containment members. China is the regional hub economically speaking, in 20 years the RMB will probably be freely used across all borders. It is already used in many parts of SEA that border China.
Finally the thesis that China is pursuing all three goals of economic, military and diplomatic avenues is an exaggeration. If Chinese military spending was outpacing GDP growth then maybe you would have a point. But Chinese military spending is in fact simply keeping pace with GDP growth in China. I more see the military and diplomatic aspects of Chinese polity as simply the surface currents to its internal and domestic security and economic well being. In other words - military and diplomatic growth or recession in China is largely governed by the domestic economic and sociopolitical situation. It is not a conscious goal that Chinese leaders pursue but simply as required with respects to its domestic needs for natural resources, markets, technology, and what not.
I agree.
Without exploiting the Chinese Hukuo-Proletariat, Christmas in the USA would be rather bleak according to the following article in "The People's Daily":
Thank you for the long piece. All I have to say is read the book.
Following up on my comments above. As for regarding the Chinese inability to deal with the barbarian problem. First of all you have to realize the Chinese frontier was not some fixed diving line. In fact regular trade and commerce occurred with the "barbarian" people throughout Chinese history, and this was pierced by periodic bouts of warfare. This exchange of culture and technology went both ways. As someone pointed out already the key to Chinese weakness vis-a-vis the north frontier was war horses. Chinese horses were not as strong or hardy as the steppe ones. If you ever drive around Inner Mongolia you realize that it is all flat land. Therefore a mobile enemy is always at advantage with respects to a agricultural civilization. This is contrary to Europe which is heavily forested and mountainous at convenient geographical choke points. This trend would not be reversed until Chinese gunpowder technology reached the point so as to be able to defeat cavalry. Notably this finally happened by the time of the Manchus.
I think you need to read the book. The question arises, why where the Mongols able to militarily defeat the Song Empire, but not the Vietnamese, despite launching three failed invasions. The differences in terrain Southern China and Vietnam is one of degrees. Both heavily forested and mountainous. Later the Vietnamese submitted to being a Mongol tributary to avoid future Mongol invasions.
Mao was pragmatic, but not pragmatic enough to avoid getting China in that positions in the first place. All the problems with the USSR could have been avoided.
You need to read the book, the author explains how intertwined Germany were culturally and economically it was with Britain was in 1890s. How the Britain managed to establish an alliance with the French, who competed with the British overseas.
The problem is China is not just using economic/political pressure, if you considered armed surveillance ships political pressure, to beef up its negotiating position. In his book he mentions this:
"This is the tendency of Chinese officialdom to believe that long-unresolved disputes with foreign countries can be resolved by deliberately provoking crises, to force negotiations that will settle the dispute."
Again you need to read the book. People can come away with those conclusions by read a 1 page review. The book is 268 pages.
I don't know enough about Song and Tran Vietnamese history to justify making a comment about why the Mongols conquered Song and not Vietnam. But do keep in mind that the Mongol Song war was not a one sided affair, it went on for a very a long time.
How economically intertwined were Britain and Germany really? I am pretty busy at the moment so I can't do any research but you have to compare the degree of trade and mutual investment between Britain and Germany and then between China and the U.S. before jumping to conclusions. Of course I recognize that trade dependency does not negate conflict, after all Japan was a major economic partner to China before the Marco Polo incident. It is not simply absolute trade but the type of and relative size of trade that matters.
"This is the tendency of Chinese officialdom to believe that long-unresolved disputes with foreign countries can be resolved by deliberately provoking crises, to force negotiations that will settle the dispute."
Like I said I haven't read the book and probably can't find the time to. But, just taking this argument for what it is without seeing the rest of the argument. There are two ways to respond. First, what constitutes deliberately provoking crisis? I can think of only two real incidences, the Sino-Soviet border skirmishes in 1969 and the current South China Sea dispute that reasonably fit into this category, possibly you can include the '79 war with Vietnam. The rest, I would not considered unprovoked. Secondly you can just as well argue that in the majority of border disputes where China resorted to force the issue was resolved favourably.
1. The sino-soviet border skirmishes, lead eventually in 2004 to Sino-Russian demarcation and Russia ceding some islands to China.
2. The Sino-Vietnamese war and subsequent low intensity war in the 80's lead eventually to the border demarcation between the two countries. Someone lost some land I don't know who, the details are classified.
3. All border disputes with the 'stans were peacefully resolved
4. The sino-indian war hasn't lead to a resolved border yet but it there have been no further conflict since '62 and the status quo is effectively respected by both sides.
It seems to me in terms of land borders, China has pretty much resolved all of them through mutual compromise save India. It is only maritime borders that neatly fits in to argument you quote. And that has as much to do with the strategic maritime environment as Chinese negotiating tactics.
" It is not simply absolute trade but the type of and relative size of trade that matters."
What does that mean?
"Like I said I haven't read the book and probably can't find the time to. But, just taking this argument for what it is without seeing the rest of the argument. There are two ways to respond. First, what constitutes deliberately provoking crisis? I can think of only two real incidences, the Sino-Soviet border skirmishes in 1969 and the current South China Sea dispute that reasonably fit into this category, possibly you can include the '79 war with Vietnam. The rest, I would not considered unprovoked. Secondly you can just as well argue that in the majority of border disputes where China resorted to force the issue was resolved favourably."
The book is quite short, you can read it about 4-5 hours, at least the important part. How long did it take you to write this 10-15 minutes. The book explains why China had little problems with conceding the land borders.
" There are two ways to respond. First, what constitutes deliberately provoking crisis? I can think of only two real incidences, the Sino-Soviet border skirmishes in 1969 and the current South China Sea dispute that reasonably fit into this category, possibly you can include the '79 war with Vietnam. The rest, I would not considered unprovoked."
The author highlights another, Sino-Indian War via Kissinger's book
"It is unfortunate that on this score the Chinese leaders are not better advised by their most faithful friend. Henry Kissinger's On China begins with Mao Zedong's October 1962 decision to break the diplomatic stalemate over the border dispute with India: Mao had decided to break the stalemate. He reached far back into the classical Chinese tradition.… China and India, Mao told his commanders, had previously fought "one and a half" wars. Beijing could draw operational lessons from each. The first war had occurred over 1,300 years earlier.… After China's intervention, the two countries had enjoyed centuries of flourishing religious and economic exchange. The lesson learned from the ancient campaign, as Mao described it, was that China and India were not doomed to perpetual enmity. They could enjoy a long period of peace again, but to do so, China had to use force to "knock" India back "to the negotiating table."
I am not sure if Mao was BS Kissinger or his commander, the incident I think he is highlighting 1300 years agois obscure, and has little to do with negotiations.
It's easy to overlook that strategy, from local to regional to grande, is directed and propelled by larger forces, such as national goals. In that sense, drawing conclusions based on China's recent past may lead to inaccuracies as the leadership grapples with phenomena that never occurred in earlier Chinese history. Among the professional Chinese warriors are liberal thinkers like General Liu Yazhou, who has been warning of collapse Soviet style the country and party and PLA fail to evolve. A few years ago he posited that the US military was not strong because of its weapons or Silicon Valley or Wall Street, but due to its total commitment to rule of law. Since then he's been promoted twice. A quick read of 'Why Nations Fail', by Acemoglu and Robinson, and Fukuyama's superb 'The Origins of Political Order' leave no doubt about which road China should take. It's strategy will be pre-ordained.
"the inherent incompatibility between the concurrently rapid growth of China's economic capacity and military strength and diplomatic influence"
Isn't diplomatic influence based on the other two?
Funny. I got this message from the Economist in my email box:
Dear Michael Dunne,
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This is what I wrote in response to that offending post:
China was nominally a victor in WWII (like France). In terms of military realities, it really represented two surviving entities - the CCP and Chiang's government - that then had to consider impending civil war.
Look at the scramble after August 15, the focus was on moving into strategic territories, acquiring the prestige of taking the Japanese surrender and seizing Japanese military assets (equipment, even people).
So the period of surrender was quite complex in China from August 1945 on into the following year, with an emphasis on positioning for renewed, internal power struggle. And involved the presence of foreigners too, with the Soviets firmly in control of most of Manchuria, and the Americans landing at Tianjin with about 50,000 troops, and providing logistical and advisory support to the Nationalist.
Otherwise, not sure treating the Japanese as an unequal will prove
productive. More likely to drive them further into the arms of the Americans (reinforcing an Asian equivalent of the US/British special relationship).
If there was a master-slave relationship after 1970, then how did the Japanese manage to retain mercantilist trade policies, penetrate, if not take over, huge swaths of domestic industrial sectors in the US, and run up significant trade surprluses?
One could argue the Americans were institutionally too focused on
military/diplomatic concerns from the cold war, and didn't have calories to keep banging away on trade matters (something that intermittenly happened under Nixon, and then later, under Reagan).
The problem is the Economist removes all post, even the ones below it. The point is there are 3 articles about Japan, and people shouldn't be posting about Japan here.
'Human nature' or 'Human Idealism', which one has the staying power?
Pax-Americana for the most part is driven by an ideal: we, the US, try to do the right thing with our values (which we think is universal) and might (which is unique).
Pax-Sinica (if there is going to be one) will be driven by pragmatism as result of recognizing and making the best of, however not going against, evolutionary human nature.
I admire human-idealism, but I live human-nature.
You said:
"I admire human-idealism, but I live human-nature"
I assume that's why you live in the US and admire China.
Yes, I live in the states, and I admire China's state craft, though not the authoritarian system itself.
What about you? I know you fear China, but where do you live?
Well actually the US constitution was set up to manage and channel human nature (hence the division of powers into three branches for starters).
The "we are not governed by our higher angels" sentiment was quite strong with drafters of this system.
Interestingly, the amendments were added in to gain political support for ratification of the constitution (really driven by pressure from the anti-federalists).
Now that is not to say there wasn't a strong thread of idealism that emerged with the declaration of independence, a good dollop of it grounded in the enlightenment (like plagiarizing Lock).
That idealism seems to fixate contemporary Americans more than the real origins of the Constitution, or realities of common law, etc. (nevermind historical issues like slavery, inequality, etc.). And tacked on to that is a big vein of internationalism catalyzed by Woodrow Wilson that waxes and wanes.
This Wisonianism can be problematic because of the disproportionate control the executive branch weilds in matters of diplomacy, and more importantly, disposition of military forces (especially since the congress seems to have allowed its powers to atrophy in these matters).
But the the underlying architecture of the US political system is grounded in managing human nature, to strike a balance between effective government and ensuring accountability and representation of interests, however imperfectly practiced.
I live in a Chinese vassal state (there are many of them!) and most Chinese would consider me a dark-skinned uncultured barbarian and that's why I am afraid of all the arrogant materialistic greedy ethnocentric über-nationalistic Chinese (including the KMT remnants in Taiwan and elsewhere lol). I hope there are still some "normal" Chinese left in the world who are not so "carried away" by "China's rise" (I blame that dumb German Kissinger!) and are more individualistic like me (or Han Solo) and are not hell-bent on following ideological harmonious pheromones for the Glory of the Great Han Civilisation.
As I said years ago (you can ask Devils Advocate_1 and other WMD's; they keep track of every single word I say!):
"Many expatriate Chinese view China not only as a nation or a state but as a "distinct" civilization and so their loyalties are always first towards China and not to the country where they hold citizenship. An article in "People's Daily" even stated openly that being Chinese is not a matter of citizenship but more of loyalty to the Great Han Civilization"
China should be aware that when oppressed people (such as Tibetans and Uyghurs) are afraid of losing their "primitive cultural identity", they do illogical things (self-immolation for example) which has nothing to do with materialistic or monetary goals. Money and Power are transient phenomena. To be human is not (yet!).
Yea you are a "Han Solo" (lol more ridiculous arrogance and self aggrandizement) who doesn't belong to the "Bamar tribe" and and yet you seem extremely hostile to all things that you consider "foreign" in Burma, despite living in Canada yourself.
You have ranted against the Indians, Chinese, Vietnamese, British, etc influence and genetics in Myanmar many times. Why would you care about such things if you weren't so obsessed with the "Great Burmese Civilization" and was not part of the "Great Bamar Tribe"?
Your arrogance and hypocrisy astounds me on so many levels. You think that people should take you seriously as an "expert" but of course nobody does, so you resort to trolling the Internet with multiple accounts and then recommend your own posts to make yourself feel better. How sad :(
So are you Canadian or Burmese? Which passport do you hold?
I assume that you are Canadian, but yet you are willing to cause harm to the Canadian interests such as by opposing the Northern Gateway, a project that is widely supported by most Canadians, in order to further your Burmese cause.
As a Canadian, you should be focusing on trying to improve Canada and not attack what you perceive to be the "foreign genetics" or "Y-chromosomes" of Burma (Chinese, Indians, Rohingya etc), correct?
Canada is a multicultural and tolerant country, and not like the racist ethnocentric ultra-nationalist Burma. Perhaps you should learn to be more Canadian?
Why does your loyalty to your Burman people and "Great Burman Civilization" greatly outweigh your loyalty to Canada?
Again, your hypocrisy astounds me. But don't worry, your transgressions has not gone unnoticed and what goes around comes around.
Just FYI, "tocharian" (and other accounts that he has on this website) is just an extremely racist and ethnocentric Burman who "fears" that they are "too many" Chinese, Indian, and other "foreign" Y-chromosomes, or genetic material, in Myanmar, so he takes to the Internet to rant against those "races" of foreigners.
Just look at how many times he repeats the world "Y-Chromosomes" in his posts.
I'll be the first one to tell you: Chinese civilization does not mean it is civilized in a sense that it is superior and ideal. To me it meant, in a span of 3500+ yrs of continuously documented human organized living, that Chinese civilization is an evolutionary record of a large group(s) of people and its living (i.e. the goods, bads, and uglies.) If I want to distill that civilization into one word- 'survival' is it, one that tells me who (human being) we really are (not who we aspire to be), and how to make the best of situation. In other word, almost a 'natural law' inevitability to it. That's the, typical but not all, realist Chinese approach to life; come with it an studied obliviousness to ideals and idealist. I won't say Chinese are loyal to Han-Civilization; I would say Chinese have learned to take advantage of lessons accrued in its 3500+yrs worth of literature.
I'm sorry you had to experience Chinese racism in your native land. I can only surmise that: almost all SEA Chinese were originated from economic refugees, therefore, there is an extra desperation, crassness and nakedness towards material wealth as a form of personal protection, and closemind-ness to 'outsiders' (even though they themselves are foreign originated). I can only hope the rise of living standard in your country can bring a more equitable society that benefits all; pre-ww2 European Jewry should be a mirror for SEA-Chinese.
As for minority issues in China, I'm not sure we're getting the full picture from the liberal media (naturally bias against the authoritarian regime) regarding the severity of the issue. It's just hard for me to believe that people in general will sacrifice material gain for ideals. Maybe the Chinese faith(or blindside) is that- it assumes most everybody, motivated by self-interest and sooner or later, will acquiesce to the 'merit' of the Chinese approach: buy-offs and buy-ins.
Have you asked folks around you about it?
I'm amazed by your width and depth of understandings of both nations from an American (I assume you're one) perspective.
Tell me: in your gut feeling,
- Can America and China get along?
Normally I don't waste my time responding to one-comment chinese commentators (it is actually against the comments policy of TE to post ad hominem attacks) but I just like to point out that there is serious opposition by various groups in Canada to pipelines and oilsands. A lot of the indigenous people oppose it. See here:
By the way it is telling that Chinese protestors are so indignant about any opposition to these things (Northern Gateway, CNOOC takeover of Nexen etc.). The Harper government normally argues to the general public that the pipeline will be used to sell Canadian oilsands to all countries in Asia, not just China.
You asked: "Have you asked folks around you about it?"
About what?
If you mean about "Chinese racism in Southeast Asia" as you phrased it, then: I know many Southeast Asians and other ethnic groups living in China's periphery (including Tibetans and Uyghurs) have experienced that for thousand of years. It's nothing new for us.
If you mean generally about the "Chinese way-of-life" and the recent "Rise of China" and what it means for other countries (besides China and the US) then I have talked about it with many different people including people from Africa (Sudanese for example), from the Middle East and Europeans (Poles, Czechs, Austrians etc.).
You should talk more often to non-Americans but don't let them know you are Chinese to find out what their views are underneath the politically-correct facade.
Ahh yes it is against The Economist's comment policy to launching personal attacks (by labeling people as "WMD"s for example) against everyone you disagree with.
Speaking of TE comment policy, posting off topic posts, which you obsessively do inevery single Burma or Rohingya article, are also against the rules.
Of course the Northern Gateway is a pipeline used to sell Canadian oil to all of Asia, but you personally oppose it because you know the major buyers will be China, Japan, South Korea, India, all of which are Asian countries and races that you have disdain for.
Speaking of wasting time, why is it that you waste all of your time trolling about why people in real life won't take you seriously? Why spend all of your time hating on Luttwak, Burma experts, etc. and do nothing worthwhile with your own life?
"tocharian" is very good offering most-likely fabricated anecdotal evidence of his own "personal experiences" to try to support whatever facile claim he is making.
But let's look at some facts. Here is PEW's global opinion research poll conducted for the USA, the EU, China, and Russia, which are the only three countries plus one super-national entity surveyed.
USA: http://www.pewglobal.org/database/?indicator=1
EU: http://www.pewglobal.org/database/?indicator=28&mode=chart
China: http://www.pewglobal.org/database/?indicator=24
Russia: http://www.pewglobal.org/database/?indicator=27&mode=chart
All of the data is from 2012. As you can see, China scores much better globally than Russia and almost as well as the USA and EU.
But why don't you ask tocharian to ask the Rohingya, Karen, Kachin, Rakines, and most of the other ethnic minorities of what they think of the Burman majority? In fact Myanmar probably has the worst ethnic conflicts in the world and the Burman majority is probably one of the most hated dominant ethnic groups in the world.
"It's nothing new for us."
You are talking about how the Kachin, Karen, Rakines, Wa, Rohingya, and most of the other ethnic minority groups, including the Indians (the "slave race", as you like to label them) and Chinese have suffered racism and oppression under the Burman, right?
But of course you don't care about those people, since you Burman are winning against them in Myanmar, and may eventually assimilate them make their cultures dissapear. All you care about is keeping "foreign" genetic material out of Myanmar so that you can maintain your Burman dominance.
In case you were wondering, this is how the Burman treat their ethnic minorities. This is directly quoted from the BBC.
"The largest ethnic group is the Burman people, who are distantly related to the Tibetans and the Chinese. Burman dominance over Karen, Shan, Rakhine, Mon, Rohingya, Chin, Kachin and other minorities has been the source of considerable ethnic tension and has fuelled intermittent protests and separatist rebellions."
From PBS:
"Significant minority groups include the Karen, the Shan, the Rakhine and the Mon. Burman dominance over minority groups has fueled ethnic tensions."
This is what they do to people with dark skin. They treat the them like inhuman trash.
Internet Unshackled, Burmese Aim Venom at Ethnic Minority
Some Burmese hypocrisy (and arrogance and audacity) is just amazing, isn't it?
- Can America and China get along?
My gut feel says yes. Maybe a bunch of rows and bruised feelings along the way, but yes they can get along.
At the most base level, the nukes on both sides will keep whatever prejudices, aggressive thoughts, immaturity, flawed thinking, arrogance, delusions, etc. that may manifest in different interest groups or leaders in both countries at bay.
In Dune there was a statement about "fear is the mind killer" or something like that.
In this relationship, "fear is the sobriety maker." And those nukes guarantee that.
With that redline already established, all sorts of confidence building measures are possible, even if things seem to go south over trade, some freekin island, or navies and airplanes going bump in the night.
I am cautiously optimistic. Have a merry Christmas and Happy New Years.
It's true I don't have much contact outside of American and Chinese people. From my observation, there are some similarities between the two, and the one that stands out is a 'border-less' frankness of the two people: American thinks everyone should want to be American, Chinese think they will do OK everywhere they go. Therefore, both people are 'confident' in their own way, and don't really think what others thought of them. Or, 'arrogance' if you want to phrase it. I don't think I'm racist nor arrogant, but somehow I came across that way to you. Is it my delivery, or your reception, the problem, or both? Anyway, we should try to talk to, not pass, each other and, in the process, learn something as takeaway.
One's opinion is influenced by his experience. Therefore, I tried not to be swayed by 'outlandish' delivery, but find out the why's and try to address that as factually and unemotionally as one can. One thing I learned is that my reality is based on my 'interpretation' of facts or events on the ground, and that 'interpretation' has a lot to do with my temperament, education, intuition..and other personal traits and life experience. So I give allowance to others because we're not the same. I don't think there are malfeasance intended here by any poster, just degree of expression.
China, being the new big kid on the block, is a fact. However, the 'reality' of which is interpreted differently by the rest of the world. And it's going to be a long haul for China to explain itself. The US has been at it for the last 60+ years, and our record is only 50-50.
"That's the, typical but not all, realist Chinese approach to life; come with it an studied obliviousness to ideals and idealist. I won't say Chinese are loyal to Han-Civilization; I would say Chinese have learned to take advantage of lessons accrued in its 3500+yrs worth of literature."
I love how you make up what you feel as being "Chinese". I guess you haven't been in China during the 1950-60s, when almost everyone was idealistic. Chinese people are more driven by ideas then Koreans/Japanese. What about May 4th Movement?
Societies that adopt Communism are not pragmatic or realistic !!! Only after 30 years of idealism, did the Chinese have sense knocked back in them.
"I'm sorry you had to experience Chinese racism in your native land. I can only surmise that: almost all SEA Chinese were originated from economic refugees, therefore, there is an extra desperation, crassness and nakedness towards material wealth as a form of personal protection, and closemind-ness to 'outsiders' (even though they themselves are foreign originated). I can only hope the rise of living standard in your country can bring a more equitable society that benefits all; pre-ww2 European Jewry should be a mirror for SEA-Chinese"
I don't like the word economic refugees, I could see illegal immigrants as economic refugees. Almost Chinese going to SEA bought a ticket to those places.
"As for minority issues in China, I'm not sure we're getting the full picture from the liberal media (naturally bias against the authoritarian regime) regarding the severity of the issue. It's just hard for me to believe that people in general will sacrifice material gain for ideals. Maybe the Chinese faith(or blindside) is that- it assumes most everybody, motivated by self-interest and sooner or later, will acquiesce to the 'merit' of the Chinese approach: buy-offs and buy-ins."
Like people willingly handing over their wealth during the 1950-60s. China is an ideological society. Why would would the CPC conjure about socialist jargon for simple things? You think they do that for fun?
"That's the, typical but not all, realist Chinese approach to life; come with it an studied obliviousness to ideals and idealist. I won't say Chinese are loyal to Han-Civilization; I would say Chinese have learned to take advantage of lessons accrued in its 3500+yrs worth of literature."
I love how you make up what you feel as being "Chinese". I guess you haven't been in China during the 1950-60s, when almost everyone was idealistic. Chinese people are more driven by ideas then Koreans/Japanese. What about May 4th Movement?
Societies that adopt Communism are not pragmatic or realistic !!! Only after 30 years of idealism, did the Chinese have sense knocked back in them.
"I'm sorry you had to experience Chinese racism in your native land. I can only surmise that: almost all SEA Chinese were originated from economic refugees, therefore, there is an extra desperation, crassness and nakedness towards material wealth as a form of personal protection, and closemind-ness to 'outsiders' (even though they themselves are foreign originated). I can only hope the rise of living standard in your country can bring a more equitable society that benefits all; pre-ww2 European Jewry should be a mirror for SEA-Chinese"
I don't like the word economic refugees, I could see illegal immigrants as economic refugees. Almost Chinese going to SEA bought a ticket to those places.
"As for minority issues in China, I'm not sure we're getting the full picture from the liberal media (naturally bias against the authoritarian regime) regarding the severity of the issue. It's just hard for me to believe that people in general will sacrifice material gain for ideals. Maybe the Chinese faith(or blindside) is that- it assumes most everybody, motivated by self-interest and sooner or later, will acquiesce to the 'merit' of the Chinese approach: buy-offs and buy-ins."
Like people willingly handing over their wealth during the 1950-60s. China is an ideological society. Why would would the CPC conjure about socialist jargon for simple things? You think they do that for fun?
Same to you, and all.
We'll have to agree to disagree.
So far you have just come up with cute statements, nothing that supports your statements. How can pragmatism describe the Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, Taiping Rebellion? You talk about Chinese being not idealistic, but I remember an old Chinese Indonesian man who told me during Great Leap Forward, people would eagerly hand over heir metal utensils to have them smelted into pig iron? Is that pragmatism or realistic. They weren't forced to do it.
You keep on beating the drum that keeps on saying that Chinese are realist. Every culture has a bit of realism and idealism. To be frank, that is why the KMT lost, they ended up in Taiwan, for being too "realistic" / "corrupt" / "pragmatic". Without the idealism of the early CPC followers, there would be no PRC. No one expected the CPC to have survived the Long March. It was idealism/ideals that kept them going.
To support you argument that Chinese are oblivious to ideals you have give me pragmatic reasons why people would go on the Long March, with a very low chance of survival. Why they did the Great Leap Forward? The pragmatic thing to do is just stay on the farm, and don't go on the Long March. Less than 1% of the Chinese people did the pragmatic thing, and escape China in 1949. Its an awfully small number. In contrast, during the Korean War 2-3 Million fled to the South.
This thread is getting a bit too long but let me pick upon three issues:
1. I think this arrogant talk about American and Chinese "exceptionalism" is dangerous for the rest of the world. Germany and Japan had similar ideas about 80 years ago.
2. I think pragmatism (Confucian or otherwise) is very often a code word used for greed, materialism, profit-taking, hypocrisy, exploitation, cheating, corruption, inequity, etc. etc. All the things that I find ethically and morally despicable.
3. "China's rise" can be environmentally very destructive to the rest of the world (just look at Burma and Cambodia or even Canada).
Yea greed, materialism, and profit-taking are "ethically and morally dispicable." Why don't you go start your own truly communist country somewhere? Lenin, Mao, Ho Chi Minh, Castro, Chavez, and others have led their countries to shit by adopting communism. Why don't you go ahead and do the same to the Bamar? I am rooting for you, although as such an inept person who spends all of his time trolling the Internet because you has nothing worthwhile to do, I doubt you can gain any influence in Myanmar.
As for hypocrisy and exploitation (of the Karen for example), why not look in the mirror? But obviously you don't care about the Karen seeing as how you have ~3 thousand posts on this website alone complaining about the British, Japanese, South Korean, Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese, American, and other "foreign" influence, genetic material, and businesses in Burma but have made ZERO posts that condemn the Burman for causing all the ethnic conflicts in Myanmar.
The Chinese are not particularly pragmatic compared to Westerners, as described by Bismarck.
As a half-Chinese (mother's side is Chinese) and half-Caucasian, I believe that through my experiences I have developed pretty good understanding of both Western and Chinese society, and my observations are that the Chinese, and most non-Westerners for that matter, perform, on average, far more illogical actions than their Western counterparts.
Now the West and the USA isn't perfect when it comes to pragmatism (high religious people for example), but China could learn to be a lot more pragmatic and logical by adopting most things American.
This article is about Communist China, but since Chinese posters keep bringing up this "Bamar nonsense"(I am not even a Bamar LOL), let me re-post 3 of my more recent comments (you didn't read all my posts obviously)
October 6th, 2012
Most Burmese are mixed. The first Commander in Chief of the Burmese Army after Burma gained independence was an ethnic Karen named Smith-Dunn. The last King of Burma, Thibaw was half-Shan. Ne Win was half-Chinese. The drug war-lords who got very rich like Khun Sa, Hsing Han Lo (what a nice Burmese word lol) his son Steven Lo (or Law) are Chinese. I can go on.
By the way, China doesn't allow ethnic armies for the Tibetans, Uyghurs and other minorities and the US doesn't have a "black army"!
June 15th, 2012
"Skin colour is definitely an issue in Burma (just look at the ads in popular magazines and the entertainment industry), like in many parts of Asia (even in India skin-whitening is a big deal) Of course, most Asians would not admit that publicly (at least not to the "whites" lol), but the Burmese Consul-General in Hongkong (now an ambassador at the UN) Ye Myint Aung said publicly in 2009 that "Rohingyas are dark-skinned and ugly as ogres compared to the have fair and soft skin of the Burmese". Isn't that blatant discrimination by skin-colour?"
June 14th, 2012
"Racial discrimination (not just in Burma) is, in my opinion, very often based on 4 factors (in the following order):
1. Skin colour (and other physical features)
2. Money
3. Religion
4. Education and Culture
The order is important!
Skin colour seems to be the most important one in Asia (the UN emissary Ibrahim Gambari was never taken seriously by Than Shwe). Asians are rather obsessed about skin colour (there are lot of skin whitening creams available all over Asia). Korean soap operas are very popular in Burma (a lot of kids in the big cities in Burma really try hard to look like Korean stars). Most Burmese also seem to have a much higher tolerance for illegal immigrants from China (there are lots of them in Burma but perhaps Burmese consider Chinese as "indigenous" and think of them as distant cousins "paukphaws", maybe because they "look more like Burmese" (whatever that means lol) and besides, the Chinese nowadays have enough money to bribe corrupt Burmese officials and buy Burmese ID's, even prime real estate in places like Lashio and Mandalay.
Anyway, it's not going to be easy for the poor uneducated dark-skinned Muslim "illegal immigrants", in Burma or elsewhere. I wonder how Burmese think about lighter-skinned very rich Muslims from Saudi-Arabia or Dubai (where some Burmese generals might have bank accounts?) Incidentally the last Mughal emperor of India Bahadur Shah II (a Muslim) was sent to Burma by the British and he died (peacefully) in Rangoon in 1862."
I have a lot of other comments where I am extremely critical of the military junta, their cronies and in general about the Burmese upper-class with their corrupt business ties to China and Singapore
First of all, nobody expect you yourself actually takes you seriously or cares about what you write. You must realize this seeing as how you spend so much time and effort posting on different accounts and then recommending your own posts.
1. So when the BBC, PBS, NYTimes and other credible newspapers report about how racist the ordinary racist Burman are, you expect people to believe you, an ultranationalist and ethnocentric Burman over those credible newspapers? That only the "elite with foreign connections" is racist but the general population is not? Funny thing is that by all accounts in credible Western media, the Burmese elite is actually not particularly racist and the ordinary people are far more racist than the elite.
2. You have at most acknowledged (but not criticized) there is discrimination in Myanmar against the Rohingya but have written NOTHING to actually criticize Burman racism and repression against the ethnic minorities in general. You have, in your 3 thousand posts on this website, never even mentioned the racism against minorities with similar skin tones such as the Karen and Kachin. Instead you spend all of your time complaining about "foreign genetic material" in Myanmar.
BTW it's funny how you complain about off topic posts when you just quoted 3 of yours that happen to be extremely off topic. Why try to bash China, the USA, and other countries in Rohingya articles that have nothing to do with China, the USA, and other countries? Of course most of your posts are off topic and copy&paste spammed, aren't they? Also you are, by all definitions, far more "Bamar" and certainly "Burman" than I am "Chinese", you ridiculously hypocritical Burman twat.
"the US doesn't have a "black army"!"
African Americans in the US doesn't feel the need to raise an ethnic army, because most other Americans are not racist against them.
The Karen, kachin, and literally a dozen other ethnic groups feel the need to raise armies to fight against Burman oppression.
It amazes me how delusional and arrogant Burman ultranationalists cannot understand this very simple concept.
OK let me go back to the topic of the article:
The struggle between an ant-like society working for the glory of the (evil) Empire blindly following "ideological pheromones" and civilisations that value the freedom and the glory of the individual human spirit is of course a classic theme.
Personally, I prefer the primitive barbaric freedom of the Sentinelese (a vanishing tribe from the Andaman islands) to any kind of Sino-Orwellian vision of the world. This sinocentric, hegemonic and materialistic world view of the CPC is actually even more of a threat to many poor countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, where China is intent on exploiting energy and natural resources with total disregard of the devastating ecological and sociological impacts. So who's "bashing" who?
I'm also tired of hearing how the West is jealous of "China's rise". Remember Mao Tsetung's "Great Leap Forward" failed miserably because the West didn't help (even the Soviets didn't!). This new "Great Economic Leapfrog Forward" was definitely supported by the West, especially the US (starting with Nixon and Kissinger).
I find it also surprising that not just 95% of the population in Mainland China, but also the majority of overseas Chinese living in the West (including students and academics at some top Universities) still defend the policies of the Communist Party of China. This to me reflects the level of "ethnocentric pheromonic brainwashing" involved.
Have you crawled out of your cave, our Burmese troll. Pragmatism is not a codeword for greed, it means being realistic. Chinese in the PRC are cynical now, because they were too idealistic for far too long. But its understandable that you wouldn't know the difference.
"Personally, I prefer the primitive barbaric freedom of the Sentinelese (a vanishing tribe from the Andaman islands) to any kind of Sino-Orwellian vision of the world. This sinocentric, hegemonic and materialistic world view of the CPC is actually even more of a threat to many poor countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, where China is intent on exploiting energy and natural resources with total disregard of the devastating ecological and sociological impacts. So who's "bashing" who?"
I will gladly send you to the Sentinalese. They will happy to see you. The last time some Indian fishermen went on their island, they ended up dead. I think the Chinese posters here hope you will share the same fate.
"I find it also surprising that not just 95% of the population in Mainland China, but also the majority of overseas Chinese living in the West (including students and academics at some top Universities) still defend the policies of the Communist Party of China. This to me reflects the level of "ethnocentric pheromonic brainwashing" involved."
The vast majority of the overseas Chinese will not support the CPC. Why? Because bashing silly Burmese is much more enjoyable. No go back to Burma and start reproducing.
Judging from what people say about me (a proud homo-erectus caveman lol) and the noble Sentinelese, I start thinking that even some of the Nazis were probably a bit less racist.
Oh well, I will leave Asians to their skin-whitening creams and their hair-bleaches!
It's funny because that little Burman freak claims to be neither Asian nor Burmese and yet spends all of his time trolling about foreign genetics in Myanmar. I guess that Burmese don't really understand what the concepts of hypocrisy and blatantly obvious lies are.
Why do so many idiots who take themselves a lot more seriously that other people do spend so much time self aggrandizing on the Internet? Oh wait I know, because according to "tocharian":
"I am in my 60's and I get along better with 20 year olds than 40 somethings. The 20 year olds are more honest and listen to me (sometimes!). The 40 year olds are a bit too arrogant and materialistic (for my taste) and tend to think they know a lot already. I don't often hang out with people my own age, because they talk too much about how their smart investments have brought them a good retirement income. I still work for a living. I don't have enough money to retire and play golf. I never invested in the "money markets". I believe it's better to die without leaving a big footprint (carbon or otherwise!). Just fade away. Perhaps humility is the key to happiness."
So funny!
The Nazis may very well have been less racist than the Burman, because at least the Nazis treated most of their Western European neighbors humanely. You Burman manage to oppress almost all of your ethnic minorities to a point where they feel the need to raise an ethnic army against you.
As for Asians and their beauty products, well I'm half Asian and I use neither skin whitening cream nor hair bleach. What about you? Are you not 100% Asian? You seem to have an extremely hard time grasping this concept, but someone who complains obsessively about "excessive foreign genetics" in Myanmar obvious cannot be all that independent of his Burman people. This concept seems to be very obvious to everyone except you.
It's true. I have no money and live off social welfare, occasionally moonlighting as a waitress (the name is Penny), so I'm definitely not leaving a big carbon (or tarsands) footprint like people from the greedy ethnocentric and materialistic "Asian Economic Powerhouses" that are hell-bent on exploiting weaker nations, destroying the natural environment and looking down upon primitive tribes. I am truly an "Untermensch" (a mix of Denisovans and Homo Erectus I believe)
There is nothing funny about that LOL
What's your other half? African like Obama?
No actually, according to your many of previous posts, you are an "independent brave soul who is not part of the Bamar tribe" despite complaining all day on the Internet about too much foreign genetics in Myanmar.
You are an "hidden expert on Burma, China, India, and the rest of Asia" who is "wiser than the globally recognized experts and scholars" and can "write a better book than Luttwak", but choose not to do so and instead spends all of his time trolling the Internet about "excessive foreign genetics in Myanmar", about how "materialism is ethnically and morally despicable", about how "pragmatism is a code word for all of the world's evils", and many many other moronic claims.
"ethnically despicable"
That's a good one man!
Trolling about typos on the Internet forums when you have nothing better to say is a somewhat sad activity to partake in and a total a waste of time, even by Internet troll standards.
In case you missed the point, the funny part about your post is not that you're poor but rather that "all 60 year olds, all 40 year olds, and most 20 year olds" in real life don't take you seriously, and that you find all 40 year olds and 60 year olds "arrogant and materialistic."
The fact that you are such a massive social and professional failure in real life with extremely poor interpersonal skills (I see that you spent all of Christmas Eve trolling these forums; I assume no family or friends) combined with the fact that you hold yourself to such high regard while trolling the Internet is quite possibly THE MOST FUNNY piece of hypocrisy I have witnessed in a very long time.
So I decided to read a bit more about Myanmar, and came across another one of your posts on a different website lol.
You wrote: "is not xenophobic or racist, but pure self-defense and self=preservation"
Funny thing is that literally all xenophobes and racists use the "self-defense and self-preservation" reasoning to justify their xenophobia and racism. Here are a few examples:
1. The Norwegian shooter who murdered ~50 kids believed that he was "protecting his country, Norway, from a Muslim invasion."
2. Americans who favor deportation of tens of millions of Hispanics and then shutting off most immigration believe that they are "protecting their white country from a Hispanic invasion."
3. Chinese males who feel cheated that white men are taking most of the most attractive Chinese females, complain that white-male Chinese-female couples is just another form of Western imperialism.
Seriously think about it. How are you, obsessively complaining about foreign genetics, any different from any of the racist xenophobes mentioned in the examples above?
Why is it always angry single males who complain about how "their women" (lol Burman women are not your objects and do not belong to you, just like Chinese women don't belong to Chinese men) are "being taken" by foreigners?
Why don't you learn to be more like Suu Kyi, who as an "enlightened Burman" (unlike you lol) is not a racist xenophobe? She is only opposed to human trafficking, which is obviously very bad, but not to Burman women marrying other races. She herself, after all, married a white man didn't she?
Where did you find that "quote". How can you (someone using these one-comment names) claim it was me?
What's the context? Was it about the Chinese copper mine near Monywa or about the Chinese gas/oil pipeline across Burma or what?
In any case, to quote a short phrase where people cannot see the whole context is plain rubbish.
When I respond to other people's comments, I always do it on the spot, as a reply directly underneath the other person's statement so that the context is obvious. You should learn these protocols of civilised debate.
Who should learn "these protocols of civilized debate"? The person who prefers to launch ad hominem attacks, by labeling people as "WMDs", against everyone he disagrees with?
Or the person who recommends his own posts, no matter how obviously stupid to everyone else (pragmatism is "codeword", materialism is "unethical", etc), over and over again in order to try gain a little bit more attention for his propaganda?
In any case, here is the link to the article. It is over 6 months old which is why I didn't reply there.
And let's not forget all of the words and ridiculous claims that you try to put in other people's mouths so that you can attack them. Most of your posts consist of straw man attacks, which is shunned upon and generally not welcomed in civilized debate.
"the last Mughal emperor of India Bahadur Shah II (a Muslim) was sent to Burma by the British and he died (peacefully) in Rangoon in 1862"
I went looking for his grave on two occasions, without success. It is supposedly near the base of the Shwe Dagon, but no-one in Burma seems to know exactly where.
Bahadur Shah II 's grave is on a small street (I think Ziwaka Lane) between Shwedagon Pagoda Road and U Wisara Road (about halfway between the Shwedagon Pagoda and downtown)
Incidentally the grave of Thibaw, the last King of Burma is in India.
Many well-to-do people in Rangoon and Mandalay are Chinese or half-Chinese and so they don't know or don't want to know anything abut Burma's historical ties to India. It is a deliberate policy of Han Chinese to rewrite history in their periphery as part of their long term sinicisation (economically, politically, culturally and demographically) strategy.
P.S. here, I found a link for you:
USA is smaller than China (population, land mass, and soon will be in economy size too), yet USA has 12 carrier battle groups, thousands war planes and other expensive war machines; China's military is only a fraction of the USA's. On what basis Edward Luttwak believes that the USA can achieve three strategic goals (economic capacity, military strength and diplomatic influence) at the same time, while China can't? Is it because he believes "only the West can invent and only the West can succeed?"
In landmass the US is comparable, in arable land the US is way ahead. On a per capita basis, I don't think anyone expects the Chinese to outdistance the Americans any time soon (not until after 2030 I believe).
As for the military, it depends on what you are measuring. In terms of manpower, the Chinese military is larger than the US' for instance.
Concur with Michael Dunne's comments but feel compelled to point out that China's military size, organization and capabilities are appropriate and acceptable to China's leadership and people. If they want to change something, they will. Same with the US, which has a different set of strategic and regional missions. It appears that Eddie Luttwack's basic points about US power were not appreciated. The difference between PRC and USA in attaining economic, military and diplomatic power is that the USA developed its power over an extended period of time, and US dominance was largely accepted. Chinese leaders, in fact, have largely cooperated or at least avoided competing directly with the US and allies in conventional power arenas since 1980, but have exploited and developed numerous economic and diplomatic opportunities in Africa, Asia and Latin America, as well as Europe and even Canada and Wall Street. Or should we expect the US to prevent China from expanding its diplomatic, social or economic connections? Why? Ever since Richard Nixon, US policy has been quite supportive, encouraging and even assisting China's emergence and growth as a competitor and a cooperator, not far different from European and other Asian friends and competitors. Now that the fruits of that policy are ripening, why should the US be afraid? Why do people want to talk about US-PRC war when continuing peaceful economic competition and growth is what all of want. The year is 2012, not 1912...
I don't know why the following (and a series of fine discussion that followed) were casued to be removed by a perhaps hapless poster. Well, it's Christmas.
I did not read the whatever book that's being reviewed by this Economist article and don't intend to read it based on this review. And I don't care to comment the global role of China since every nation on earth has its global role of some sort.
But in terms of one subset---the Sino Japanese relationship, IMO, China has done much less well than the US did on its American Japanese relations.
Granted the US was then (and is now) the most dominant world power and China was among the weakest of the victors of WW II, but a victor nevertheless and Japan did formally submitted and surrendered to China in Nanjing. But the respective mental attitude of China and America toward Japan, not just the sheer power, set them poles part in terms of influence over Japanese affairs following the war.
IMO, China has had foolhardily treated a defeated Japan as an "equal entity" mentally, physically and protocol wise. China the war victor had mistakenly not regarding Japan as war loser and surrender-er in its subsequent dealings with Japan, even to this day. Such approach of kindness did not and does not invite respect nor appreciation from Japanese.
To the contrary, the US has had wisely treated a defeated Japan as an "unequal entity" mentally, physically and protocol-ly. US the war victor had correctly regarding Japan as the war loser and surrender-er in all its subsequent dealings with Japan, to this day.
Such mentality of approach influenced the continued US stationing of armed forces in Japan that resulted in a "Master-Slave" like relationship that has since dominated American-Japanese relations.
Thanks to such vision, such US mentality fitted nicely into today's US strategic thinking with Japan reduced to a client tool of the US implementation of its strategic positioning. Yet such mentality of approach has also won the respect (or fear) and the appreciation of Japanese (at least on the surface of it).
I applaud China's long standing policy of treating other nations as "being equal" regardless their sizes, but IMO China should now abandon its "being equal" mind set with respect to its former aggressor Japan and instead adopt the American mentality of treating the defeated Japan as an unequal nation always a cut below ( ), Japanese economic prowess and military muscle notwithstanding.
A switch to such attitude may actually be helpful to the resolution of some bilateral issues such as Diaoyu Islands, especially when the US is playing a major role in them.
Nobody can put the root of the problem China is facing regarding Japanese bellicose and hubris toward China better than nkab. nkab's comment should be sent to China's Politburo Standing Committee, so that China can take the right mentality like the American to treat the defeated Japan, an unapologetic war criminal.
Maybe because you used the J word. If you want to write about Japan-Chinese relations there are 3 posts in the Economist in the last week about the Japanese elections. The actually do talk about Chinese-Japanese relations. I'll help you.
The Japanese posters will be happy to know what you think about them.
I'm aware I sound a bit snarky in saying this but every time I read your posts I can't help thinking they simply convey the latest propaganda so newly minted in Beijing. This (no so)subtle twist on anti-Japanese sentiment and right-wing Chinese nationalism is simply the latest installment.
Japan is a burnt child. If you ask Japan who did that to her? she might say just US only and nobody else. In WWII, US suffered loss of 100k marines in pacific and defeated Japan by killing about 1.5m of the IJA. Both Japan and US deliberately ignored the bloody war fought between Japan and China during 1937-1945 whereby 500k and 30m were killed. After the WWII and for political reason, China has been ignored by US as one of the contributing party to the victory. Following the Chinese civil war and the unfortunate Korean war, US and her allies had regarded commie China as their foe and imposed very hostile embargo on her for a long time until Nixon's visit in 1972. Due to these incidents, China (including KMT in Taiwan) has lost the right to be regarded as a victor towards Japan. After the WWII, it was Japan who got huge help from US, not the winning but battered country China (the ally of US in WWII). Now that China has succeeded to be No.2 in the global economy challenging naturally US in many fronts, US in response making use of Japan as her agent has started strengthening the containment link around China in the pacific. China might be upset by Japan's attitude displayed especially in the Diaoyu Islands. In order to alter this situation, China has adopted a more assertive manner in the pacific to elevate her political position. IMO, there is no return for this go for China. If you think that the situation in the west pacific would thus become tense, I have the reservation. If you regard US can muster enough countries on her side, I also have the reservation. China has in effect established a very strong ties with many other the countries in the region. As such, how could US and Japan mess up the current order there. IMO, its not easy. Things might go more the China's way. Many people guess that China can surpass US in military by 2030, I concur but would like to add "before" in front of 2030.
Happy Boxing Day
Hong Kong
It's apparent that the US is using a defeated Japan as an implement of its containment policy, yet it's also true that Japan is hijacking this US policy, by prostituting itself, as a means to rearm and reboost itself to the detriment of Asian security.
It didn't have to be like this. And it's not certain who is to laugh all its way to the bank, or the bunker.
@ Bismarck
"I'll help you"
I thought you have "helped" me, "Miceal Dunne" and a few others on my post above already.
@ Fooli Cat,
I work for a SME (in China) and I have been at it for a good number of years. My job took me to frequent visits for my company to places mostly in Asia but also to America (3 trips this year) so I do read some foreign magazines.
My comments to the Economist are unrelated to my company's business. They may or may not reflect the current thinking of my government, but like most posters here, nobody asked or made me to comment except me myself.
And there's one thing I don't do in my commenting, that is to attack or return attack/ defame to anyone (or any nation) without being first provoked in that article or its commentaries---Something you apparently do aplenty and thought nothing of it. Who made you to?
I agree with your observation as posted fully.
IMO, the world is exponentially more complex today than 75 years ago yet peoples' judgment or wits have not expanded exponentially to match. While one should be confident about his country to "win", nothing is for certain in the foretelling---Not for China and not for the US.
Ideological, cultural and economic conflict of interests are bound to happen even within a single family (microscopically or minutely speaking), and almost certainly between nations. I only hope that people of the two countries have the good senses to see each other not as zero sum false adversities but as largely complementary true partners.
There's no reason they couldn't do that, like a lyric out of "My Fair Lady": "I have got accustomed to his/her face". It may take some getting accustomed to by both, but it will do and I am confident about that.
I think "by" 2030 is possible. The question will be, would that be a priority by 2030, or would social services for the population (particularly aging demographics) take precedence, like in Western Europe since the 1960s/1970s.
Similarly, in the near term the need to ensure a sustainable internal market may take precedence (have a domestic economy thrive, grow, largely recover on its own with minimal stimulus or need for exports to compensate, over the next ten years or so).
Regardless, seems like the Chinese had stuck with sufficiency for some time (with nuclear weapons say), and spending behind the revenue, in having growth military expenditures not exceed GDP growth (or not by too much in case actual expenditures are higher than official figures or western guesses). And some projects would naturally attract outlays out of prestige, like the carriers and fifth generation fighters and space program, etc.
But....those prestige projects may present significant spin off opportunities too, in helping Chinese industry move up the value chain, work with advanced materials, develop sophisticated components and communications systems, learn advanced machining/automation practices, gain new, invaluable project management skills, etc.
I have taken issue with the 30 million fatality figure for China for WWII. Won't repeat the points, but believe there are fair assessments/estimates that are much lower (in the 13 to 15 million range).
For the 500,000 for Japanese, does that include the Soviet invasion at the end of the war, dramatically called August Storm by westerners, with the seizing of Manchuria, capture of large numbers of Japanese civilians and military personnel?
I realize the Japanese actually incurred heavy casualties in the lower Yangtse in 1937, but thought the war wounded down after another year, into a more manageable tempo from a casualties perspective (not economic, resources though, since it forced mobilization of the population on a war footing in 1938).
Overall I think the Japanese incurred fatalities of at least 2.3 to 2.5 million for both civilian and military populations.
I can't recall the specific source, but recall a huge source of casualties for the Japanese was fighting around and in the Philippines (a veritable meat grinder for the Japanese army, and a disaster for the Japanese Navy).
Righteous indignation will only get you so far. But if the opinion I commented on is truly your own them I'm sorry that after the past few years you've been posting here that you haven't worked through your overt bias against the Japanese that makes yo think of them as being "a cut below".
actually no peace loving nation on earth should treat japan as being equal. if japanese insist on being unrepentant still, they are indeed 'a cut below', perhaps way below.
you see, with its ww2 surrender, japan is the only country being nuked, and twice. japan is the only country in the world that is still being completely occupied and controlled by a foreign power ever since ww2.
germany has some allied bases and detachments of allied troops, but nowhere near as completely occupied as japan is with so many bases all over japan plus naval ports. even the headquarter of japns air force is now relocated inside an american base in japan.
the us choke hold on japan is complete, thorough and good for the world but devastating to japns psyche. and japan today has little or no say to its own foreign policy (and even its financial policy) without being first cleared or advance approved from the us.
that's why japans elections are reduced to mostly local agenda as pseudo-democracies or vassal states are.
it's no surprise that among the very first thing mr abe did after his election was to call us president mr obama to plead and pledge his 'allegiance' and 'loyalty' to the usa by saying the usa is japan's 'only friend'.
it's not that mr abe is weak or anything, such bootlicking is necessary if mr abe wants to keep his new job for a while longer than his last one.
The write off of about 500k Japanese in China in WWII should be a reliable figure. This might include some tens of thousand Koreans. The Chinese collaborators are excluded as they were dressed differently and usually not engaged in the frontline battles fought. The west made a wrong assumption that China would be conquered within a short period of time by Japan and thus rendered no aid to China. China, without proper provision of arms and ammunition, succeeded to bog down Japan in the mire. US was only forced to enter the war after the surprise attack of the Pearl Harbor by Japan. US won the war by using her overwhelming gun powder on Japan. That's no tricky task. China would have achieved the same to beat the shit out of Japan if she had got such power at disposal. China has certainly learnt the lesson. The need to build up an arsenal of deterrent size for the nation is well understood (at least by her nationals) in order to maintain peace in the future. The need to restore a proper status in the political arena is next item on the agenda.
Philippines suffered a loss of over one million in WWII. Its strange for a colony to serve two masters at a time and get involved in their colonial war. So sad.
In regard to China's priorities, I believe that China would have enough money in the years to come to make improvement in almost every aspect. Unlike US who is facing a fiscal downturn, China don't have to scale down funding for some items to avert a deficit budget. China will continue to shock the world with her mega projects such as the railways, telecommunications, giant companies, aviation, maritime-tech. and the like. The same weight will be placed on social well being of the country. All are not empty talks. When China has the money, all nationals will benefit. In another 3 decades or so, China can produce quality nationals comparable to any elegant group in countries like France and England. Japan will not be on the role model list for the Chinese for sure.
Japan has got enough luck and miracles in the past. People are aware that Japan in on decline. Yet, Japan will still be better the war time Philippines: to serve two masters at a time.
'Japan has got enough luck and miracles in the past'
your post is quite apt.
japan was able to rebuild itself post war (to world's #2 economy) because almost 100% of its being an occupied and vassal state of the victor us.
all this is because americans' benevolence of governance of japan and the korean war. the korean war provided japan being used as bulwark to deter communism in asia strategically and as the main supply provisioning and R&R base economically. such economic boost to japan under us protection umbrella continued with vietnam war, providing japan with 20 some years of unprecedented and unimpeded fast pace economic growth.
such growth was further helped by generous us technology transfer and infussion from transistor radio, color TV, VCR (yes VCR too), to cutting edge satellites and ground stations for communication, weather and broadcast (BSAT), to launch rockets (delta II) to fighters and military eclecronics. (with some of them came back later as furtively improved upon and cheaper products beating the shxt out of american originals commercially that eventually led to plaza accord meted out by the boss the us. ask 'nkab', 'east wind'...they seem to be experts on these things from their posts.)
and japan did so by being obsequious and abjectively submissive to just about every whim of the occuption force to please the us. the price for all that is of course that japan was and is not allowed to be an independent nation (they change prime minister like changing diapers, 9 in 9 years). so even during those economic high flying years of japan, there's nothing japanese should brag about.
but with china's rapid rise, the fortification of guam and the us space technology advances, ground bases of geo-proximity (such as japan, taiwan) are rendered less as important as before to the us. in a nut shell and sad to say, japan's 'good luck' is about to run out, if not already.
Edward Luttwak discusses the strategic implications of the rise of China for its neighbours and for others in the region, like Australia and the United States.
Dear Edward Luttwak
First of all, why only calculates who has ruled China for the longest in the last millennium? It has been around for five millenniums - give or take. xia, shang,zhou, qin, han, sui, tang, song, ming are the dynasties that ruled by Han. Khitan and Jurchens never ever gained control over China, whereas Mongols adopted Han's institutional structure to rule China. Mongolian rulers in Western Asia and Europe were Khans, but in Yuan dynasty in China the ruler was in fact an Emperor. Even the name of the Mongol Dynasty - Yuan, was hand picked by Khan Kublai from a Chinese classic The Book of Change. China is not the only country that Mongols conquered: the Caliph and the whole europe was taken over as well. That is a loss of agricultural civilization to nomadic civilization on the battlefields, but not on cultural factors, such as Sun Tsu's the art of war. In fact, it is Han who eventually defeated the Mongol Empire.
As for the Manchus and the Qing dynasty, they did not really conquer inner China; they got lucky. It was peasant uprisings that overthrew the Ming dynasty, not the Manchus. When Manchus took over the administration, they largely adopted Ming's rules, laws, institutions, and logics. The Constitution of Qing is basically a knock-off of the Constitution of Ming. Ever heard of Confucianism? It was adopted as the ruling culture of Qing dynasty, just like those dynasties where the royal families were Han.
I agree that China may suffer from some level of Great State autism, just like any other great states in any period of the history. But really? I think this whole book and the background of the author of the book is the evidence that USA is suffering tremendously from such a syndrome. Think about it: a book on China written by a non china specialist. How can one be confident enough to write a book about a civilization and a country that he or she has absolutely no knowledge, while crediting his or her theories as as correct and universal as Newton's law? Cannot believe a cocky man like him who has no curiosity in knowing more and therefore has only less-than-half knowledge can be trusted to work on a position as important as military strategist. Guess maybe a very low level military strategist he is.
China has its problems in Myanmar. There are several causes: 1. Chinese firms that disregard local environmental and ecological protection; 2. local people take their anger towards Myanmar government and military on Chinese firms and projects.and 3, U.S influences (in Beijing's view, definitely negative influences, if not instigation). But Beijing is ready to take it. We don't live in 19th century any more. Everybody is in everybody's sphere of influence. Myanmar as to the U.S, is just like Canada, Mexico, Cuba, or Latin America in general as to the PRC. Welcome to Asia, my dear Uncle Sam, and please welcome China to enter the Americas. You know it is inevitable.
Yes, China is trying to pursue all three of the powers: economical growth, military modernization and global diplomatic influences. But Beijing is not trying to have them all at the same time. Economical growth and societal stability will remain as the priority of CPC's agenda in the foreseeable future, and military build-ups and diplomatic influences are not ways to enhance it, but to protect it. Besides, the latter two are natural products of a fast growing economy. As long as the economy can keep going (and i hope it will, for the sake of europe and the world), PLA will for sure get some new toys every year, and people in the world will for sure want to hear about how Beijing think about certain issues that are related to them. No need to pursue them intentionally.
Without american backing, you seriously think Vietnam and the Philippines were willing to turn against to China? China's military growth did not drive them away from Beijing;it is the U.S who is pulling them away.
MR. Military Strategist, the world may be a little bit more complicated than you think. The mere fact that you think that there is such a universal logic of strategy that would apply to any cases is an evident that you know way too little about the world. I don't know how long you can keep your position as a strategist, but i suggest you cherish every singe second of your professional life, for it may be taken away from you and granted to the more capable's any time in your career. And trust me, there are a whole tons of more capables's.
I agree with this point:
"Economical growth and societal stability will remain as the priority of CPC's agenda in the foreseeable future"
I agree with the expection of some military modernization to be a given, like provisionign the military with new, exciting toys (all militaries like them), as well as the likelihood of China's opinion being sought more frequently in different diplomatic circles.
But I think there is still a question of how much "military build-ups and diplomatic influences" will help China or prove counterproductive and expensive.
Seems China has been a little hamfisted unexpectedly at times of late, with certain issues. Like with the Senkakus, the South China Seas disputes, possibly Burma.
I still don't get the whole development with Burma - The US really put them in the dog house, while it must have been really hard for the junta there to break longstanding habits and change diplomatic direction (which included changes in domestic policy).
Also some points from the post appear defensive. Like reference to Vietnam, which has had a recent history of being ready to take umbrage with the Chinese over certain issues. Heck there were actual fights back in the 1980s. And yes, I think Vietnam would stand up and be heard on points it considers important, on its own - They are really not an ally of the US, yet (don't think they will be either).
Otherwise, the conflicting claims over the South China Seas have been around for some time, and are quite complex. Just finger pointing at the US won't help matters.
As for the history, well a recognizable Chinese cultural lineage goes back to the Shang (2000 BC). Before that everything gets mythical, hazy, and further back, even neolithic. All of Europe wasn't conquered by the Mongols, and the Mongols did severely disrupt Chinese society and institutions, like the bureaucracies and examination system. Took some time for the Ming to put the pieces back together. The Qing practiced a degree of segregation, and retained their own institions in a system of dyarchy and management of different territories (Mongolia and Tibet).
As for strategists, well Dr. Kissinger could have easily fit this description: "a non china specialist"
He started off on diplomacy and nuclear weapons.
Now it does appear that a rough variation of his (and Nixion's) vision of a multipolar world (from 1971) is emerging, albeit with some different actors (China and India instead of the USSR and Japan?).
Of course academics and consultants get wrapped up in their theories. Doesn't mean they shouldn't be given a hearing. Granted practictioners tend to come off as more compelling (Clauswitz? Macchiavelli?).
He is not as arrogant as you think. The irony in international relations, you don't have to understand much about a country, because the system and regional environment and compels them to act a certain way. I read the book, 60% was about how other countries were reacting to China. Do you have to be a specialist in each country to write about those countries?
Yes he is arrogant, but so is a person writing a one page commentary of a book eview to the author about a book which he has never read.
The funny can be applied to people who use Sun Tzu. Has Sun Tzu even visited the US? Ridden in a car, airplane? He is really arrogant, but so are the practitioners of Sun Tzu who think they can apply such philosophy in an age of nuclear weapons.
Michael...Dunne?? from Lincoln?
Your knowledge about Chinese history really astonishes me. I agree i was very defensive and my wording was indeed problematic, especially with the Yuan dynasty. I was trying to hide my discomfort of the part of history where Han was treated as a third or fourth class citizen. You are absolutely right that the mongols did not take over the whole europe. But they did fight and cause trouble in the majority of the erasia continent. That at least i am certain to be true.
I have absolutely no clue what the hell is going on in Myanmar. Maybe we can do some study on that subject. But the Junta, now the President Wu is open for a change. I guess the rationale behind it is the same with Mongolia's logic on looking for a third neighbor, and with Canada's open up its energy resources for Chinese state owned state run energy firms. They are just looking for more options, and that should be encouraged.
I think you are wrong with Vietnam. What i said was that, without America's backing, Vietnam will not turn against China this quickly by his own. There were land wars in the 1970s and maritime wars (or conflicts) in the 1980s. But that was because they were backed up by Moscow. And they are still now, though to a relatively small extent. Without these outside factors, Vietnam would be out of their sweet mind to challenge Beijing. That is what i was saying. Can you imagine if Mexico is threatening to take over the Mexican gulf? And no, Vietnam and America will not become official allies. However, they moves can be coordinated, and they have been. If you want examples, let me know.On the other hand, the Philippines, whose voice and position is even stronger than the Vietnamese, is indeed a US military ally. Excluding Washington, i do not know who else to blame.
I would not accept your notion that Dr. Kissingeer is not a china specialist. But that is not the point. What i was trying to say is that, this strategist wrote a book about China, without being an china specialist, how could that be possible? why would anybody believe whatever he writes in this book? I guess part of my confusion is because i have a different definition of "specialist" from yours, but i still hold my position.
I see. Now i feel like i should read the book.
Is it a book that you would recommend to a friend?
"But I think there is still a question of how much "military build-ups and diplomatic influences" will help China or prove counterproductive and expensive"
Energy, raw materials, and sea lines of communication. Both military build-ups and diplomatic influences are supposed to be able to secure them in the future. That is how Beijing sees it. And i think it is quite plausible.
lol i doubt if there are any that kind of practitioners. And i am certain Chinese military has never ever been that kind of practitioners.
There is no need to abandon every single thing that sun tzu has written. Some can still draw lessons from the book he wrote two thousand years ago. I strongly disagree author's view on sun tzu 's art of war and Chinese mil's use of it.
Thank you for your response. Actually I don't get the reference to Lincoln (is that the movie?). Michael Dunne is my real name.
You provide some interesting points. Let me knock out this 7 mile holiday run (to counter the feasting), mull some answers/views (hopefully reasonable one), and get back to you in a bit.
Sorry if i confused you...I thought you were one of my classmates from a middle eastern class that i took a year ago. The reference to "Lincoln" is Lincoln, Nebraska, or University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where i am studying at and where i met that other Michael Dunne.
Good luck on your 7 mile holiday run! Looking forward to hearing back from you.
You seem to be a proud Chinese living in the US (enemy territory for you?). If you believe that US and China are enemies, then why don't you ask all the Chinese students in the US (especially Mingze Xi and Guagua Bo) to go back to China.
i do not believe that the States and China are enemies. Where did you get that clue from my comments? Did i even mention the word "enemy"? or "rivalry"? or even "clash"? I do not believe any of the bullshit that U.S and China are meant to be enemies. Cold War is yesterday's story now, tocharian. It is time for you to get some refreshed ideas.
The problem is once people writer a book that praises China, they are a China specialist, like Kissinger. That is really what you are trying to say.
I wouldn't, because none of my friends are interested in such matters :). I read the book, and printed excerpts from the book here. To find out if you should buy the book read other book reviews. The Economist book review is horrible. The review could have done a better job just lifting passages from the book for the review. This is my take on it.
International politics today is a game based on Western rules and conventions. So far China is playing by those rules, but most importantly everyone else is doing so. Knowledge of China is not as important as one thinks, unless China is strong enough to upend the whole Western international system and order of nation states.
The author does talk about US Autism, but says that Chinese autism is particularly bad. Why? Because their leaders thought process of international relations still have remnants of the tributary system, a system that is different from the system of nation states. In fact he describes how it manifest itself in the outside world. The Americans despite being extremely violent (author's words not mine) think along the lines of nation state, in fact one could argue the US only knows how to play that game.
China was able to setup a tributary system (really a non-Han Chinese system ie barbarian -- read the book the author will explain how it came about) because it had no peer competitors. India was blocked off by mountains, and geographically very far away. Outside of India, the rest of Asia was very small in comparison to China, mush poorer, less developed and far fewer people. The population of the rest of Asia in 1500 was 30% of China's, and economically maybe only 20%. Today how does it look? The rest of Asia outside of South Asia has a population about 65% that of China, and an economy double the size of China's. We have not even factored in the West, India etc. You can go into a Chinese history class in almost anywhere in the world, and most professor won't mention the relative size of the economies in Asia in 1500s etc. Do you know how big the Chinese economy was relative to Japan in 1890, do you want to hazard a guess? Well 3 times larger. Maybe we should live in the 19th century.
As for trying to pursue all things at once, this is what the author has to say.
""Each historical period and each state is different, invalidating most analogies. But the paradoxical logic of strategy is always the same. 1 China's rising power necessarily evokes increasing resistance, so that it may well become weaker at the level of grand strategy because of its own rising military strength— a paradoxical outcome rather common in the realm of strategy. A mild and yielding diplomacy, free of arrogance and ready to make concessions at every turn, could be a palliative for a while. But if military growth continues, such a remissive foreign policy would be interpreted in a sinister light as deliberately deceptive— mere camouflage for continued military aggrandizement. It follows that the only correct grand strategy for today's China would have to contradict common sense and go against all normal human instincts by renouncing any but the slowest military growth."
However, he does mention that eventually China could grow so large that other countries will just play along, and won't resist China.
Even the author admits that what he suggest is paradoxical and goes against common sense. He provides and illustration of Germany pre WWI.
Of course if you had a diplomat like Otto Van Bismarck, you might get away with it for a lot longer, but eventually countries will feel threatened particularly by military posturing.
The problem with area specialist in the West is they don't really have a good understanding of Western history as they should. As I said the international system is built on a Western framework, unless China somehow manages to capture 80% of the World's economy so she can live out her tributary fantasies.
I rather listen to a Chinese person who has a graduate degree in European history than a Westerner with an MA In East Asian Studies talk about Chinese International Relations.
Then why do you say:
"China has its problems in Myanmar. There are several causes: 1. Chinese firms that disregard local environmental and ecological protection; 2. local people take their anger towards Myanmar government and military on Chinese firms and projects.and 3, U.S influences (in Beijing's view, definitely negative influences, if not instigation)"
Friends of friends are friends, no?
By the way, you should not under-estimate anti-Chinese sentiments in Burma against the invasive Chinese exploitation of Burmese natural resources which was achieved by bribing and bullying the hated military junta under Than Shwe. China was caught red-handed in the blatant act of raping Burma when Burma "opened up" to the West, so no mysteries there!
About Sun Tzu, read book Luttwak's book. I will tell you two flaws that Lutawak mentions (the most important)
1) Assumption of rationality, all Han Chinese participants.
"The first detectable residue of the Warring States / Art of War mentality, or rather of the misapplication of intracultural norms to intercultural conflict, is the presumption of unlimited pragmatism in inter-state relations. The Qi, Qin, Zhao, Wei, and Yan states could be allies one day, enemies the next, and then perhaps allies again, simply because at each remove it was the profitable thing to do. Chinese foreign policy evidently presumes that foreign states can be just as practical and opportunistic in their dealings with China."
All the participants in the Warring States period were Han Chinese, and assumed to be rational actors. In Western statecraft / warcraft there is also an assumption of rationality. Sun Tzu time period is most similar to the period in the Italian Peninsula where there were many city states vying for control, that was when Machiavelli produced the Prince. The irony is that more Westerners have read Sun Tzu, then Chinese people have read Machiavelli's Prince (or for that matter Westerners themselves).
However, the West has produced military strategist (ie Von Clausewitz) much later than Sun Tzu / Machiaevelli's Prince, just after the carnage of the Napoleonic / Religious Wars in Europe, where people were motivated by factors outside realpolitik. Its reflected in von Clausewitz's works.
Almost every educated Chinese person thinks he is a strategist from reading "Art of War" and 三國演義, the best comparison would be (and its not even close) would be English Public School Boys reading Caesar's Gallic Wars and Hannibal's Punic Wars. topped off with some Thucydides.
Centuries have passed since Sun Tzu, and China has fought numerous wars, but more importantly, China has fought religious / total wars - White Lotus and Taiping Rebellions. Unfortunately, because of Chinese myopia and sensitivities, the military history of the Taiping Rebellions is not well known in China. It rivals the Sino-Japanese War in brutality. In my opinion it was China's first TOTAL WAR. It was the first time in history when women were conscripted en-mass for combat. The bloodiest war in the 19th century. The Taiping's goal was simple, overthrow the Qing, and kill all Manchus and their Han lackeys. Sun Tzu would have been shocked.
2) Over Emphasis on Deception
"Residue of the Art of War mentality that distorts and degrades China's conduct, and that militates against the adoption of a correctly non-provocative grand strategy, is an exaggerated faith in the value of deception as such, as well as of the stratagems and surprise moves that deception allows."
He also states
"Only with both good fortune and high skill can one stiletto or poisoned dagger do the work of many swords— when everything works exactly as planned."
Often you don't have access to an enemy's leaders particularly if the leader is of another culture or half way around the world. Setting up a spy network takes time, and sometimes you just don't have the time.
The only non-Maritime country to have never lost militarily to the Mongols, were the Vietnamese.. Why did the Vietnamese do what the Chinese couldn't, despite being far fewer in number? It came down to mass mobilization and scorched earth policy. Sun Tzu would never advocated such lunacy.
In the book he explains why China's over reliance on Sun Tzu is not good, he gives some examples.
Now for China caring more about domestic situation than external events, he devotes a whole chapter why Great Powers have autism, and its for that very reason !!!
What i said was "China and America are meant to be friends", but i did not say that China and America are now friends. President Obama once defined sino-america relationship as "non-enemy non-friends". I agree with him.
I am not denying the problems that Chinese firms have caused in Myanmar. I stated it as the first cause of China's problems in Myanmar, which you have also quoted. The only difference between your accusation and my statement is the wording. Other than that, i believe we are on the same page.
And it is not just Myanmar. Chinese firms also have the same problem in exploring natural resources in Latin America and Africa. Tocharian, I am by no mean a defender of Chinese government, nor of CPC, nor of Chinese multinational companies, state run or not. What i care about the most are facts. Before i came to the States, my criticisms towards Chinese government were way harsher than yours. What i am trying to do with my comments, or with my choice of degree and career path in general, is to get the American public understand Beijing's logics, Beijing's concerns, Beijing's way of doing things, Beijing's rationales of their actions. At the same time, i am also studying the way that American elites think and do things, and then bring it back to China on Chinese equivalents of Economists Online or Twitter, and my space. I believe that enhancing the mutual understandings and trusts between Washington D.C and Beijing is extremely vital to world peace and economic well being for every single member in the international community. And that is exactly what i am trying to do.
I think you pick the wrong target. But I doubt if you can find any hardliner loyalists of CPC any more. Sorry if i was appearing to be a little confrontational. That is kind of my personality and habits when discussing philosophy or world politics. I apologize for that.
To Michael Dunne: Sir, you may enjoy Dennis Bloodsworth's 'The Chinese Machiavelli'. It's a bit old, but good. Sun Tzu, of course, is the Chinese equivalent to Clausewitz. There are many more and some are actually fun reads. I'm pleased that you appear generally comfortable with the US-PRC waltz. Or is it a kung fu routine? Both?
"I still don't get the whole development with Burma ..."
Perhaps I'm over-simplifying this but don't you think Burma simply looked to the future and chose the support of what it considered the lesser of the two dominate evils? And everything that followed was Burma jumping through the necessary hoops to appease its chosen benefactor?
Hope you had a nice holidays. To get back to you. I may do this in separate entries so not to have overly long write ups:
I think we disagree in terms of degrees.
I think Vietnam would have still stood up for its interests in specific cases, namely claims with the Spratleys. I suspect they realize the Paracels will prove a more difficult claim to secure, while the Spratleys may present more immediate economic opportunities.
Combined that with the national narrative of resistance to foreigners (against the Chinese, French and Americans, and even the Japanese, although that is a more dubious case), and you get a country willing to punch above its belt that may not often be seen elsewhere.
Agree the US is probably providing a soft, diplomatic backstop, which in turn could encourage a stronger stance by the Vietnamese. However, I think the greater salience of the whole SEA controversy over the past couple of years actually surprised the Americans.
While the Americans may get a kick out of tweaking China with naval visits to Vietnamese ports (and possibly joint exercises off of Australia), I don't see much of a substantive military alliance forming. The American people aren't interested (yet, as I can tell), and I think Vietnamese nationalism would put the kabosh on any permanent or semipermanent American military presence in Vietnam.
Next up the Philippines:
You are right about the US having strong ties to the Philippines. There is a longstanding military alliance, there is the fact the Philippines was once an American colony, the two countries fought Japan together (there is a longstanding controversy over WWII Filipino veterans receiving US military benefits), and there is a sizeable immigrant filipino population (over 3 million) in the US.
On top of that, the Philippines is strategically located, astride the the South China sea, and there is a small US military presence in the archipelago.
But like with Vietnam, I think the Americans were surprised by the controversies arising recently. Seemed when the point about the treaty being applicable to spats over reefs, there was some shock by US decision makers.
I do think the US would be more proactive/assertive in providing a backstop to the Philippines, both diplomatically and symbolically (have ships come visit more, have more pronounced exercises, etc.). I am not sure about reactivation of bases - I suspect more "access" to uphold the "places without bases" thinking now en vogue (to limit diplomatic problems).
Personally I suspect the US would initially hold off from engaging in military operations even if there were some skirmishes between China and the Phillippines that went the Chinese way (say thrashed some minor naval formations like it did with the Vietnamese in the 1970s and 1980s).
If there was protracted conflict, then I could see the US establishing air cover/naval coverage of areas clearly Philippino (so they would have a sanctuary essentially, like the UN had with Japan during the Korean War).
I have a hard time envisioning scenarios of greater military intensity/escalation beyond that though.
Interesting, the US kind of gets the benefit of all worlds. It can confine activities/initaitives to the diplomatic realm, and keep its powder dry, without much downside.
Conversely, if the Chinese react, or exercise a stronger posture militarily, or get more assertive diplomatically, countries like Vietnam and the Philippines would likely move closer to the US without asking for too much in the way of committments, as well as potentially spur others to move closer to the US (like the big one would be Indonesia).
So what is in it for the US? Next up.
With the Americans, I think they may be dipping their toes in the SEA controversies and making noise about an alleged pivot (think the US has always been focused on the area, not much of a return) for a number of reasons:
- Continuing, growing economic importance of the region - it will just get more important (think Indonesia, Phillipines, Vietnam, let alone Malaysia and Singapore and Brunei)
- Need to reassure longstanding allies in light of the changing balance of power - as mentioned, the Philippines, but also Australia, Japan (not sure about S. Korea - may be a different track, or dealing with North Korea).
- Assure freedom of navigation of international waters, particularly through the S. China Seas
But more importantly, there is institutional views, and with the Navy/Marines, making sure the western Pacific isn't dominated by a foreign power had been of big importance since Pearl Harbor. It looked briefly like that would be difficult to ensure in the 1970s with the Soviet build up in Vietnam and far east territories (Vladivostok and Petropavlovsk).
In the future, the US dominance of the Western Pacific will likely be challenged by the Chinese, either assertively a la Wilheminian Germany of a hundred years ago, or with a smile (skin them with a smile as they say in Texas).
But like the Soviets, the Chinese are handicapped by geographical confinement. The South China sea is not a Chinese lake, yet, and Taiwan and the Ryuukyuus bar unimpeded access to the western Pacific.
The US probably wants to provide a diplomatic backstop to countries like Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei (with minimal military committment) so that the South China seas becomes demilitarized, or more likely results in settlements along the lines of the status quo, with a jigsaw of claims formally recognized, making a hash of the nine line claim of CHina.
With Taiwan, the US probably wants that ambiguity to continue, since it is the cork in the bottle for any real avenue for projection, sustenance of Chinese naval operations into the western pacific. However, if China pulled a Brezhnev, and just went into Taiwan and took the island in a blitz, (like the Soviets with Czechoslovakia in 1968), then I think they will just grimly take the lost.
And of course, the US would back the Japanese strongly, although I don't think to the hilt initially, if it came to military skirmishes over the Senkakus with minor vessels. If major air or naval assets get involved, that would be a different story, to shield Okinawa.
Luckily for the US, the more China pushes, the more it seems to gain diplomatically and possibly militarily, with not much use of brains or brawn calories.
So what is with China?
As for the CHina regarding these concerns:
"Energy, raw materials, and sea lines of communication. Both military build-ups and diplomatic influences are supposed to be able to secure them in the future. "
I think naval matters present a real quandary.
With energy and raw materials, I think a good central asian strategy of diplomatic and economic ties offer productive opportunities. Same said for ties with Russia.
And with coal and shale deposits the Chinese may want to import the fracking technologies of the west, as well as revisit synthetic petroleum processes. And there is nuclear energy, both for electrical generation and process heat.
However maritime trade and ensuring lines of communication will prove difficult because of that geographical confinement disadvantage.
It would be very difficult for China to get everything it wants(claims to the Spratleys, Taiwan, etc.), and in the process could badly damage relations with neighbors.
And the Philippines, Vietnam and Japan would still present platorms from which Chinese naval power could be blunted if a cold war like situation, or military scare al a pre-WWI Europe develops.
Meanwhile, merchant traffic of countries that may have become antagonistic to China could get rerouted around Indonesia/Australia (it did during WWII).
And another sea line of communication quandary would likely get inflamed, or remain unresolved, which is the lines from the Persian gulf to the straits of Malacca.
So further geographies of confinement exist, with polities that may get quite alienated by Chinese diplomatic and/or military actions.
In short it becomes a loosing proposition for the Chinese in the long term, and I don't think it changes much with time.
Probably if China quietly stuck to area denial for near shore operations of foreign navies (South China Seas and East China Seas) they would be able to get more out of investments without much diplomatic downside.
Going forward, probably best for China to assume a posture that I also recommend for the US: "Speak quietly, carry a big stick and keep a low profile"
In the Chinese case it may mean following what it did with land territories and quickly settle with several local countries in the South China Seas. If they gave that reef and some other stuff to the Philippines say, that would change dynamics quite rapidly; same for sea claims around some Indonesian Island, etc.
Seems that would follow old Sun Tzu, in using brains and skill to get most of what one wants. The Vietnamese will likely prove a difficult customer though, to be honest.
As for Taiwan, short of offering loose confederation, where the only gain was symbolic sovereignty acknowledged, and permission for the Chinese navy to pass through Taiwan territorial waters without notice, I can't think of much evolutionary change beyond the current state of ambiguity.
As I said, if the Chinese did a Brezhnev bum rush successfully, both Korea and Japan could get pretty ticked off, for some time, and it could ignite a cold war with the AMericans.
If the Taiwanese were allowed independence, the domestic outcy within the CCP may be too great, intolerable.
If Taiwan becomes a Finland/Bavaria of CHina, but more so, with own army, offices for international relations (like Bavaria did), control of internal immigration, etc. then the Chinese Navy at least has new avenues for operating in the WEstern Pacific.
India presents a whole other problem. Not sure much would change if the line of controls become recognized and permanent. Suspect India wouldn't want to see the Chinese Navy in the Indian Ocean, and there is support for Pakistan that may remain problematic.
So the CHinese have a touch situation in employing military strength, even symbolically, in areas outside of defacto recognized areas. And for some reason, their diplomacy has proven inadvertently helpful to Americans.
So a focus on just economics may make sense, and then stick with developing that posture of "speak softly, carry a big stick, keep a low profile"
As for Kissinger, I don't think he originally was a CHina expert. I suspect he developed extensive knowledge in the 1960s and early 1970s, consulting on Vietnam, working for Nixon (the guy was/is extremely smart from what I could tell, including hearing him speak), but I suspect he really made himself into a "china hand" after the Ford administration. Don't know the guy personally, but just my guess.
You are the only one writing (obsessively) about how you believe that China and the US are enemies, about how Chinese are loyal to the CPC (I guess you forgot about Taiwan as an obvious counterexample), are about how the Chinese believe that you are barbarians. But of course nobody, and certainly no Chinese person, actually said any of those things.
You try to put your own words into other people's mouths and then attack them in a straw man arguments. And then you even go to "recommend" your own posts to give yourself more credibility! (It's funny because everyone, including all the Westerners, in this conversation thinks that you're an idiot and yet the posts that you seem to be especially proud of mysteriously gets recommended en masse.)
Why do you hate the "KMT remnants in Taiwan"? Because they are ethnically Chinese? What have the Taiwanese ever done to you?
You have some serious issues.
By the way, you should not underestimate anti-Burman feelings across all of Myanmar's ethnic minorities, Myanmar's neighbors, Christians, Muslims, and probably pretty soon Westerners. The Burman were caught raping the Rohingya, Kachin, and others redhanded during its "opening up" process in the past year so there are no mysteries there!
Agree with most of your 4 posts.
One thing that I observed in recent weeks and months is that it seems like most of the countries involved in the 2012 disputes have gotten pretty burned out and would prefer to return to the status quo in the short term. If the status quo is reached and maintained, like it was from 2005 to 2009 in Sino-Japanese relations, then the possibility of long term negotiations to finally resolve these disputes, such as the 2009 resource sharing agreement between China and Japan, goes up.
For example Shinzo Abe campaigned on a hawkish tone against Chinese and South Korean claims, but after he won the election he seemed to have taken the pragmatic approach to put the two disputed islands on the backburner.
It remains to be seen how Xi Jinping will handle these disputes once he comes to power. But as someone with significant amounts of pro-USA influence and ties, Xi warrants cautious optimism from me that he will take the same pragmatic approach that Abe seem to have done. Also, China, like Japan, has lots of urgent domestic economic issues and disputes are bad for the economy.
South Korean politicians will use the Dokdo/Takeshima as a source of nationalism to win votes, but they seem content with focusing on growing their own economy.
The Philippines have been the most level headed and least hawkish of the 5 main players in these series of disputes so far, and I don't see this changing.
Not sure how the Vietnam will respond. The VCP seems to have a lot of domestic problems like the CCP, so they may decide, like the CCP, to focus on domestic issues instead.
I don't actually see any countries relinquishing territorial claims, as this type of stuff almost never happens anywhere in human history, but hopefully these disputes in time will fade to irrelevancy just like the USA-Canada borders disputes, of which technically there are still 5 ongoing ones.
Anyways here's hoping that none of these disputes are aggravated in 2013.
Agreed; and hit the recommend - hope all involved are burnt out.
I think Noda took the fall to head off Ishihara. I realize a number of others may think differently, but hey, this is the same guy who called an election that allowed his party to get pummelled.
As for Abe, he needs to pay attention to domestic issues. That is what got Node defenestrated. And I think he recalls the controversies of the senkakus/diaoyus of 2010. If Abe was a to be a diplomatic stud, he would just grant Dokdo to S. Korea, and then submit the senkakus/diaoyus to an international court. The extreme right would flip, maybe some regular Japanese would care, but his standing in the international arena would leap (but doubt that would happen).
I think Xi may be in good standing. He assumed chairmanship of the military commission pretty quickly, no? Seems he maybe able to consolidate power without too much problem. And there are a number of prestige things to pursue without causing too much tension, like the space program, the fifth gen fighters and carriers (getting the second one ready; continued tests with the Soviet one).
Funny, my Canadian cousins reminded me of the disputes over Christmas dinner the other night.
The US will do some showboating with naval port of calls and exercises. And, maybe some serious stuff with ABM work with S. Korea and Japan, in opposition to North Korea. However, deficits, taxes, keeping the recovery going will matter most this year. The Americans don't want to hear about troubles in far off countries at the moment, except for the fifth of the electorate that may want to bomb Iran immediately.
Have a happy new years.
"I think Noda took the fall to head off Ishihara."
Yea most definitely, which is sad because according to most impartial analysts such as The Economist, Noda was one of the better PM candidates in this year's election.
"If Abe was a to be a diplomatic stud, he would just grant Dokdo to S. Korea, and then submit the senkakus/diaoyus to an international court."
That would be a smart strategic move, as would China submitting the Senkaku/Diaoyu and at least the Spratly in the South China Sea to international court, but I don't either happening in any immediate future, since nationalistic claims are still fresh in the minds of many Japanese and Chinese.
Maybe in 2-3 years of inactivity when the general populace forget about this stuff. There wasn't much opposition to the 2009 Sino-Japan resource sharing agreement as bilateral relations reached probably a all time post-WW2 high, and people forgot about the 2005 text book incidence. Unfortunately Ishihara and his Chinese counterparts blew up all the progress made since 2005.
"I think Xi may be in good standing. He assumed chairmanship of the military commission pretty quickly, no?"
Agree, but the problem with the PRC is that it's so opague. We really don't know who made the idiotic decision to start all of the government-organized anti-Japanese protests. Funny thing is that those protests died down immediately after the government stopped organizing them, which leads me to believe that most of it was for show. Maybe they were trying to imitate Western protests that they saw in a Hollywood movie or TV show? Who knows.
Agree on the US.
Happy holidays.
That is a lot of words haha.
Let me finish up my research assignment real quick. I will try to get back to you tomorrow.
Happy New Year!
Although it is true that Chinese officials quote Sun Tzu to each other, how much they practice it literally is in question. I think Chinese officials are capricious and doing things without a concrete plan or principle, so any decision or any occurrence would be calculated into the risk and benefit equation.
This seems really flawed,
Hasn't history been full of empires forcing their economic, military will and conditions on everyone else?
Theres nothing different this time,
the Romans, British, Americans all enjoyed overpowering superiority military, economically and politcally as their empires grew.
Really if this comes down to alliances We already know the direction they will go.
Russia will Align with China
So with North and South Korea
As will likely the emerging Islamic authortative states in the middle east, with Pakistan, Iran.
Africa will be contested
South America will remain neutral
on the otherside
Europe and the US
SouthEast Asia, India and Japan
Russia will remain neutral, and watch China and US beat each other up.
The wedge between N and S Korea will increase and the Islamic states form their own alliance. Any connection between the Islamic states and China will be lack mutual trust and enough mutual interest to be sustainable.
How likely could certain states with primarily muslim populations become bases for extremists, jihadists, nationalists angling, etc. for insurgency and secession movements in Xinjian, or other areas of the PRC?
Not sure I understood the reference to North and South Korea. To date it seems China is tolerating a North bent on being provocative towards the South. That can't be so welcoming/popular with the South Koreans.
Now maybe if China did a 180 degrees turn and compelled the North to join up with the south in some sort of arrangement, if not outright unification, with the South wearing the pants (like West Germany back in the early 1990s), things could change dramatically?
Even in such a case, suspect a "united" Korea would prefer neutrality.
Overall, I am not sure many countries are up for a fight or even contracting out diplomatically controversial alliances. For instance, will Russia really want a formal alliance with China, or just want to keep the border quiet, tension free, and make money selling weapons and minerals and hydrocarbons?
@Michael Dunne
"Not sure I understood the reference to North and South Korea."
Actually, I understood it perfectly well. Today China is much greater trading partner for South Korea than Japan, and China now has much greater economic leverage on South Korea than in the 1980s.
Therefore, South Korea may on its own will switch sides and join the Chinese camp. Japan should begin fortification of the Tsushima islands immediately, or at least deploy the First Artillery Brigade, now based in Hokkaido, to these islands.
The issue of trade would suggest at best South Korea assuming a neutral stance in the future.
I don't think they have to "switch sides" like some minor state in the third world during the cold war.
And emotions over N. Korea's actions and any seemingly favorable posture of China (giving the papal wave) could trump trade. Recall a number of European states prior to World War I had extensive trade going on but still became antogonists.
Don't think a military build up in the Tsushima islands would be productive. Probably better in the long term to figure out different ways to cooperate with S. Korea rather than antagonize it.
Basically the book is divided in two sections
1) Talking about strategy and Chinese strategic culture
2) How individual countries are reacting to China.
The logic of strategy can be summarized by this excerpt
"Riders in a crowded elevator cabin into which an extremely fat Mr. China has just stepped in must react self-protectively if he is becoming fatter at a rapid rate, squeezing them against the walls— even if he is entirely unthreatening, and indeed affable. True, the crowded elevator cabin already contained an even fatter, louder, and frequently violent Mr. America, but simply because he had long been a fellow rider, almost everybody had over the decades come to a satisfactory accommodation with his noisy bulk, with the exceptions— Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela"
Its clear he follows a largely deterministic view of foreign policy. What he proposes is interesting
"Each historical period and each state is different, invalidating most analogies. But the paradoxical logic of strategy is always the same. 1 China's rising power necessarily evokes increasing resistance, so that it may well become weaker at the level of grand strategy because of its own rising military strength— a paradoxical outcome rather common in the realm of strategy. A mild and yielding diplomacy, free of arrogance and ready to make concessions at every turn, could be a palliative for a while. But if military growth continues, such a remissive foreign policy would be interpreted in a sinister light as deliberately deceptive— mere camouflage for continued military aggrandizement. It follows that the only correct grand strategy for today's China would have to contradict common sense and go against all normal human instincts by renouncing any but the slowest military growth."
But is dooming China, not really, in the earlier chapter about pre-WWI Germany
"But final outcomes are determined at the still higher level of grand strategy, in which all military factors are in turn dominated by the overall human, economic, and technological capacity that states can harness from their own populations and from their allies— a function of political cohesion and leadership within states, and within alliances. None of the many tactical and operational-level victories of the German army between 1914 and 1918 could break through the higher levels of strategy to reach all the way up to the top level of grand strategy. Hence, all its hard fighting achieved nothing, just as if it were the worst of armies, instead of the best. A strategically competent, nonautistic government would have recognized that only Germany's nonmilitary abilities had any value— its banks, factories, and universities could keep rising without limit, advancing the prosperity of the population and expanding German influence all over the world— as was indeed happening until 1914. By contrast, the German army could be useful only defensively and the German navy was actually counterproductive,"
In the last chapter he says the following
"These reactions, which express the very logic of strategy, ensure in themselves that China cannot concurrently increase its military strength and also its diplomatic or, more broadly, its political influence, as we have seen. Unless and until the rise in China's relative power as compared to each of its weaker neighbors passes beyond the relevant tipping point, to impose the acceptance of subjection in some form, increases in China's relative military strength must continue to increase resistance to its political influence and thus reduce it, as its potential targets find allies and form coalitions."
Can China get to the point where other countries will subject themselves peacefully, reverting to the old tributary system.
There will never ever be anymore tributary system
China , in 1956, at the BANDUNG Conference had announced its new foreign policy of the "FIVE PRINCIPLES of PEACEFUL Co-EXISTENCE"
Much better than the review. Looks like Luttwak is teaching the Chinese leadership on the right military strategy to accompany its diplomacy.Quite presumptive!
To say he is a neo-conservative hawk or even anti-China, its clear one has not read the book. When he talks about Great State Autism it applies to all large powers, whether its China, Germany, US, Russia etc. All countries have it to an extent, but larger countries are more prone to it. In the book, he spends a whole Chapter talking about German Great Power Autism prior to WWI. India has its own Autism, it consider South Asian countries as part of India, and considers the British division of South Asia arbitrary.
Great States have autism, because leaders are often too concerned with domestic issues. The Foreign Minister or the person with that Portfolio is not in Politburo. In the Soviet Union, Andrei Gromyko was Foreign Minister for almost 28 years, and was in the Politburo for almost 15 years. The irony is that when China was less integrated with the world, before 1989, Mao, Zhou and Deng took a much more active role in foreign policy.
The author goes spends two chapters describing how the Chinese tradition of "barbarian handling" and the strategem of Sun Tzu is making things worse for China now. This is what he says
"The Han could produce more and better food with earth and water than any other nation on earth, they could build the most sophisticated cultural and technological superstructure on that material base, but more often than not (twice more often, at least) they could not assess the external environment realistically to identify threats and opportunities, nor could they develop effective grand strategies to muster their relatively abundant resources, to ensure the safety of their lands, populations, and themselves."
Modern Han Chinese might take pride in their ancestor's ability to "assimilate" barbarians. Put yourself in he shoes of the average Han Chinese in 1660, I am sure he didn't take pride in helping the Manchus assimilate, if assimilation meant wearing the Manchu queue on threat of execution, being evicted so Manchu garrisons could be based.
The author warns of the danger of straight line projections. And how dominant is China, well this is what the Author has to say about Germany in 1900.
"All this meant that the British could not realistically hope to avoid their relative decline. German superiority in all things was only a matter of time, while in scholarship across the board the contest was already over: by 1900 even in British universities it was impossible to study subjects as varied as chemistry or Greek poetry without knowing German first, while English was only essential for … English literature. In finance, the more rapid generation of capital of the more dynamic German economy was prevailing over both the expertise and the global connections of the London merchant bankers and their systemic advantage in presiding over the pound sterling, the world's leading reserve currency. The Warburgs of Hamburg were overtaking the Rothschilds of London, and even the largest British banks were already eclipsed by the Deutsche Bank, the world's largest by 1914, and by far the most competent in financing industry"
What happened, well the Germans tried to challenge the British Navy
"The British-led diplomatic revolution thus accomplished by 1907, encircled Germany with the increasingly coordinated power of the British, French, and Russian Empires. In the Far East, the Russians could have been distracted by Japan, but the British had already preempted any possible German-Japanese alliance with their own 1902 treaty— the first truly equal Euro-Asian alliance, anchored by close naval cooperation. Finally, the British kept all their disputes with the United States under firm control— it was their set diplomatic doctrine to preserve good relations with the Americans"
The Germans were outclassed diplomatically, which is understandable, even with a Bismarck they eventually would have been outclassed diplomatically if they choose the strategy of naval aggrandisement. At the time, Germany as a state only existed for 30 years,
The same could be said of China, how long was China been playing the "nation state" diplomacy, about a hundred years, and unfortunately it still carries the baggage of diplomacy / strategy from the tributary system and warring state period.
Mr. Wudang Wushu aka east wind
You need to read the book.
Luttwak postulates that, in pre-modern China, the Emperor could not / did nor forsee that the Barbarian tribes were mobilizing for wars and moving to attack China
True -- that;s because , China have a large territory and it was not physically possible to guard every mile of the long borders to see the movements of the Barbarian cavalry
BUT today -- the PLA have satellites, radars, much faster transports like helicopters, sporter planes, scout-vehicles
So--- today is different from 500 years ago
It would be difficult for any aggressor to make a move without the PLA knowing about it
Read the book
In according to your comment, Edward Luttwak seems reasonable, but the nagging question is why doesn't his advice apply to his beloved nation USA, but only applies to the enemy of his beloved nation, China? In according to Luttwak, only non-military abilities have any value, shouldn't the USA disband its military and becomes a strategically competent and unautistic nation which relies on its non-military abilities to keep on rising without limit. Why does China deserve the honour of his benevolence not his beloved his nation, the USA, is he a traitor of the USA?
Or he believes American Exceptionalism is not a fallacy, rules only apply to others and do not apply to the USA.
Again read the book, or his other books about the US. Did he say that China should have no military. No, I am not going to quote the whole book for you. He actually does talk about the US spending too much on the military.
"Economic crisis, mounting national debt, excessive foreign commitments -- this is no way to run an empire. America needs serious strategic counseling. And fast. It has never been Rome, and to adopt its strategies no -- its ruthless expansion of empire, domination of foreign peoples, and bone-crushing brand of total war -- would only hasten America's decline. Better instead to look to the empire's eastern incarnation: Byzantium, which outlasted its Roman predecessor by eight centuries. It is the lessons of Byzantine grand strategy that America must rediscover today."
Just because you don't like what he has to say about China, don't accuse him of being anti-China or pro-US.
Even the best strategy needs a realistic backup to carry out the strategy; as Byzantium showed it needed some crack troops in order to use carrot (economic capacity and diplomatic influence) and stick (military strength) strategy effectively, otherwise nobody will take Byzantium's carrot.
Without a stick the USA can reckon with, USA will see China's carrot for peace and prosperity as a tribute requesting for mercy. For the moment the predatory imperialist hegemony with its racist hubris and its military superiority respect no one; only way to make Edward Luttwak's advice a possibility is to narrow the gap (economic capacity, military strength and diplomatic influence) with the USA, either one catches up with the USA, or the USA declines. Anyhow if China wants to carry out Edward Luttwak's advice, China must close the gap. Therefore one must put Edward Luttwak's advice in right context with proper prospective, particular Edward Luttwak is an American.
Again you are hyping up his nationality again. The Byzantine`s did not have a large military, at least compared to the people who were invading Europe at the time.
What does his being American have to do with it. Nothing. You can`t even listen to a person who is critical of America, the person must suck up to your inflated ego of China. China is to grow, but how should it go about doing so.
Even if she exceeds the US, she could still ended up beaten to a pulp, if others fear her. US strength in Asia is only as good as her alliances. If other countries fear China, they will seek alliance with the USA. Even if the US declines, it does not mean that China is any safer, it will mean its more likely that the Russians will side with the US in containing China. Seeing China as a greater threat then the US (ie what happened with the Soviet Union in the 1970s). Its very possible, Putin is not going to live for ever.
If China was to grow at 6-7% same as the likes of the ROK, Indonesia, Philippines, but still higher than the US,reduce its military expenditure to 6-7%, stop posturing in the South China Seas etc, she will most likely be able to undermine US alliances. Countries will feel less threatened by China in general, because they are growing at the same rate or faster, yet China will still surpass the US.
I think you are looking at the things with wrong perspective; Edward Luttwak is advising on how to achieve hegemony effectively; but China is not on the path to hegemony, she just wants to maintain her independence under adverse conditions. Building up a creditable deterrence is the only way to protect her independence. With USA's mammoth war machine breathing on China's neck, China has no choice but to respond accordingly.
I believe Edward Luttwak has put the cart in front of the horse; China cannot forgo her right to protect herself because she has to appease what others want first. China can always be a good member of the global village using economic capacity, and diplomatic influence after she has secured her security.
Any nation cannot understand China's self-defense needs and demands China to disarm is selfish and deceitful; particularly those nations want to take advantage of China on the moral high ground. They should ask the USA to lower the bar of danger by reducing arms for the world peace sake. Besides allying the strong to suppress the weak is the behavior of street thugs, so do those nations ally with the USA.
Again for bloody book. Like most people you like people to suck up to China. Say how great China is. Mr. Lurrwak is not looking at hegemony. Where the Byzatines looking for hegemony. Luttwak does no say that China must disarm. No.
What credible deterrence? Just get more nukes if you want credible deterrence.
As for US military. The most important thing for China is US military presence in Asia. The US can shrink its military to 2% of GDP and people like you would still complain if US had presence in Asia. When the US military budget was 1% of GDP in 1920, it had a greater military presence in Asia than it does now. The US has been in Asia before it was in Europe, Middle East or even before it was in the Philippines.
You are looking at it from a purely US - Chinese perspective. Luttwak does not. He describes the deterioration in Chinese-Japanese ties as well as within other key countries in Asia. Before 2010 it was getting better. You could say the Japanese provoked China, but seriously over the last two years there have been two major anti-Japanese riots/demonstrations in China. Have there been any serious anti-Chinese demonstrations in Japan?
The problem is like most Chinese / pro-Chinese posters here you feel that if the US buggers off back to the US, and leaves Asia for China, then everything will be OK. It won't. We have silly pro-Chinese posters in the US who believe the major aim of controlling the South China Seas is cutting Japanese trade routes so they can starve Japan. The response will be a nuclear armed Japan.
Again read the book,
The boundary of China has been changing from dynasty to dynasty in the past millennium of years. The China proper has invariably absorbed many races from different directions over the period. Many hostile nomads have simply disappeared from the north mainly through the integration into the China in the south. People just cant tell who are the winners or losers because there is no more distinguishable difference to tell. That is China which size is close to its peak time in history. Many Chinese in the south and overseas are definitely the descendants of the defeated.
Frankly, both the Sun Tzu's military bible and other religious bibles have got enough doubters casting their mistrust on them. Ever since the birth of the thought of science, people have got the wisdom to ask, question and challenge the old thought. Its natural because we have got another thought at play: the evolution.
The Han Chinese used to have problem to fend off the invaders from the north. Worse still, the Chinese emperors did not trust their surrounding officials. Despite there's always a strong demand for a strong military buildup for the nation, the Chinese emperors did not usually pay heed to that because they feared that the military facilities if provided might fall into the wrong hands of the generals who might attempt a coup. This over-cautious mentality led to the rulers' inaction which often resulted in fermenting a crack (showing fragility) to allure the looters to come. The nomads on their horseback could easily defeat the Hans who were mainly the infantry. Given enough horses, the Hans might be able to put up a decent fight to drive them back. But unfortunately, this was not always the case.
The nowadays China might still have the dilemma because of the internal threat caused by some minor group separatists. This traditional fear has prompted China to be cautious in the same manner as in the past. It is said that the spending on internal security has surpassed that on military. Both are in the region of RMB 700b. Two links on Chinese para-military are provided for information:
Insights into China's politics, business, society and culture. An allusion to Confucius, the name means "things gathered up" or "literary fragments"
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Democracy in America
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subset: commoncrawl