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Jun 23

I came across two articles recently, both concerning India/China relations but one written from the Chinese point of view while the other was written from the Indian side. I thought it might be interesting to compare the two viewpoints to see just how far apart they really are.

The first article is from the China Daily while the other is from an Atlantic Council forum. The China Daily article feels there are ‘three gnawing issues’, as they put it. The Indian side looks at it historically, politically and diplomatically. They are both short so I’ll include them in their entirety.

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Mar 29

Note: This was submitted by Rhan on the “Cultural Differences” thread but I felt it deserved its own space for comment.

“Food is central to the Chinese psyche and I think they believe that everybody should be entitled to food whereas Westerners look at it differently.”

Sorry Steve, what I paste below is a bit long, if you think the content is irrelevant, please go ahead to delete or collapse. No hard feeling on my side. This piece was written by a friend of my few years back, whom I respect very much. My intention is not to criticize the west, but to partially answer the point raise by Chinktalk.

+++ Since the First Opium War, the vast number of Chinese masses never had sufficient food to eat. Famine was a feature of China, as it was for India for much of its history. That country had 25 famines during the BRITISH administration alone. One of the worst took place at the Deccan area, which killed over four million. In Mike Davis’ “Late Victorian Holocausts,” it was estimated that there were between 12 and 33 million avoidable deaths in India between 1876 and 1908. And as late as 1943 around 4 million died in the Bengal famine, an event that some commentators have blamed on official policy, but which others have claimed as an act of genocide. All these have not been focussed or even mentioned in passing by the West. There was no talk about the failure of capitalism, of imperialism, or even racism. Indeed, if Davis has not come out with his recent book, much of the world wouldn’t have known such things happened.

Let’s talk a bit about China’s Great Leap. That was a period of hardship or at least near-starvation as well, and indeed part of the problem was due to inexperience, incompetence, and macro-management. That’s not too surprising as, after a century of being a semi-colony, few Chinese understood the geography of China, much less how to administer the continental-sized country. Almost all of China’s main cities, rivers, and even provinces were in foreign control one way or another. Even China’s customs was in foreign hands until 1943 – a huge shame on Chinese civilization and bitterly felt by the Chinese people. The Chinese were described in travel books as incapable of logical thinking, that they were unruly and deserved to be crushed by the boots of Prussian discipline. Meanwhile, foreign-occupied Shanghai was sporting clubs with signs saying “No dogs and Chinese allowed.” This, in China! The Chinese didn’t find the West weeping for their democratic rights then. The poor, wretched, hungry masses died like flies EVERY DAY – average life expectancy was like pre-1950 Tibet – around 35 years.

If this was the situation during PEACETIME, it was worse during the war. But all things have their seasons, and in 1950 China, for the first time in over 100 years, emerged as an independent country under the Chinese Communist Party. There was much to be done, but straightaway the country was faced with the possibility of its perceived enemy at the Korean border. So Chinese troops were sent to face the armed forces of the greatest power in the world. After being the “Sick Man of Asia” for a century the country, united as never before, managed to surprise the world by forcing American troops into what Cold War architect George Kennan called “the longest retreat in US military history.” Even more surprising, it was the US that called for peace, on the threat that they would use atomic bombs if China were to refuse to negotiate.

But the war took a great toll on the Chinese, which besides the loss of over a million lives owed the Soviets billions of roubles for their often inferior armaments (only the MIG 15 was considered world class, and that too eventually was not a match for the improved American fighter jets). The country, just emerging from a century of devastation, was faced with enormous challenges both from nature and from external threats such as SEATO and the American 7th Fleet in Taiwan. China was unable to get UN help as the Americans had persuaded the world to recognize Taiwan as the true representative of all China (nowadays, with Beijing having the upper hand, the hint is that Taiwan should be independent!). Worse, Taiwanese agents were regularly sent to sabotage the mainland’s infrastructure – this was proudly shown in a magazine called “Free World” and distributed to many Malaysian schools by the USIS (my elder brother used to tear the mag to wrap his books. Once, however, I recognized the fabulous paintings of Chinese-American artist Dong Kingman, and snatched the pages from him). Threats along the coastal areas forced Mao to locate China’s industries in the hilly hinterlands, which of course was difficult and expensive. Many modern Chinese just don’t understand how difficult it was for China to develop then, not to mention the Western embargo on China of advanced industrial goods, which continues even today.

Older Malaysians – those at least over 60 – know from their geography books that China’s Yellow River was known as the “River of Sorrow.” When it flooded, millions of lives would be lost. Drought was another curse. Thus the new government started from the basics – building dams, shoring up the dikes, and planting trees to prevent desertification, cool the land and conserve water. There was little money for machinery – most were done by human labor. Yet, by the mid-fifties, the country was gaining ground – it even had some surplus grain for export.

There were often open military threats – Chiang Kaishek was probably encouraged to put the heat on China by promising “imminent” invasion on every national day in Taiwan. Meanwhile, the US had proceeded from the atomic to thermonuclear or H-bomb. China had no choice but to keep up with the R&D, and by 1958 was able to send its first sounding rockets to space.

Could it be that the progress of a few years made China’s leaders swollen-headed? Perhaps a bit of that, but the point of the Great Leap wasn’t merely a struggle to become a modern power. The mass collectivization and setting up of people’s communes was to make every commune a fortress. These communes were to make not merely basic implements for farming, but also the manufacture or repair of armaments. Mao had envisioned not only an entire country of self-sufficient farmers, but also soldiers. That was the faith he had in his people – few real dictators would dare to place arms in the hands of millions of powerless people.

The plan was good, even revolutionary, but the implementation was disastrous. First, China was such a large country that one really could not tell the peasants what to plant – they knew their land better than the leaders in Beijing. So it was an error to turn rice fields into wheatlands, or vice versa. Moreover, local uneducated cadres, always wanting to be heroes, would send glowing reports of their districts when crop disaster was staring at their faces. If China were a small country like England, things might’ve been easier. It was not that easy to find out the truth in a huge land with primitive infrastructure (a more democratic press might’ve helped, as Amartya Sen suggested).

On top of administrative failures and backward technology was one of the worst droughts in modern Chinese history. Plants withered in many places, and many people didn’t have sufficient water for daily use, not to say watering the crops. Deng Hsiao-ping, to impress his newfound foreign American friends, later claimed that about 16 million died during those years. If we take the years 1958 to 62, that would mean about 4 millions per year – somewhat the same as the Bengal famine of 1943. But I doubt that figure as many of us in Malaysia had relatives who, despite telling us of their hardships, never gave any hint of any famine. Foreign visitors, including well-known ones such as BBC head Felix Greene, reported hardships but no famine. Another reason for the numbers could be the normal deaths from decades of malnutrition: the revolution was merely eight years old and many of the survivors were born during a time when life expectancy was around 35.

But that people were in near famine conditions – that I believe was a possibility. It was brought about through over-optimistic planning, bad administration, and the worst drought in modern history. However, the 16 million, already inflated to support Deng’s “reforms”, was as usual doubled to 30 millions by the West, and a decade or so later that was doubled again to 60 millions. We all know the Western play on figures. The tens of deaths at Tiananmen was inflated to “hundreds, if not thousands” whereas, DURING THE SAME DECADE IN KWANGJU, KOREA, over 2000 students were run over by tanks and armored cars by the US supported Korean dictator but often reported as “200.” In the Korean episode, the massacre was approved, if not planned, by the US military (did the mass media report on that at all?).

Whatever the case, the Great Leap was a disaster, but the farmers knew that the drought had played a large role, and on the whole did not blame the CCP. This was proven in an indirect way: around 1962 the US, knowing that China had experienced great economic difficulties, thought it might be time to support a Chiang invasion. Chiang’s troops were ready, and so were the transport ships. The invasion was debated by Congress, and finally given up because American intelligence suggested that the peasants would rise up and demolish Chiang’s troops. The US did, however, persuaded Australia from selling grain to China – another sign how caring that country was towards the Chinese people (and the crocodile tears they shed today).

The Russians under Khrushchev did not help either: instead, they demanded that China send grain to them as part of the agreed payments for Korean War loans. That, and little else, was why China became the Soviet’s bitterest enemy, until the break-up of that country.

The Leap was the only agriculture disaster in the last 50 years. Industrially, though many of the goals were not achieved, there were progress in a number of fields. One was the manufacturing of farm products that were inexpensive yet helpful to peasants, such as a rice-transplanter machine that made backbreaking labor a thing of the past. To alleviate the energy problem, biomass – the use of rotted vegetation for energy – was used to give even the remotest villages electricity. Small hydro-electric equipment that could be placed across streams were used by poor farmers around the country: it was so useful that the product was exported to countries in Africa and especially the Philippines. Though not really a success, the experiment saw a population that began to understand the requirements for an industrial state: this experience was to pass on to a new generation which, after the Cultural Revolution, saw China’s explosive growth.

It was clear that by the 60s, socialism was the best way to develop, but what Mao saw an insidious growth of capitalist tendencies. Towns and cities seemed to grow at the expense of rural areas. New hospitals flourished, while peasants were left to their own devices. In a famous speech, he scolded the Ministry people: “Why call yourself the Ministry of Health? Why not the Ministry of Urban Health? Better still, why not call yourself the Ministry of Urban Gentlemen’s Health?”

His speech galvanized the movement of medical care to the countryside. The country began to train people in providing basic care to the poor. “Barefoot doctors” roamed the countryside, giving traditional Chinese medicines and acupuncture and helping to build sanitation facilities. Every Chinese – from civil servants to the poorest peasant – had by then been required to have a midday nap. All had to wake up as the sun rises for morning exercises. In the cities, lights were off not long after dark. Traditional martial arts were modified for health purposes. Chinese life expectancy rose from the pre-1950 35 to over 65. China’s population boomed. At the end of the 70s, it was clear that China needed a population policy. The one-child system was adopted a few years later.

But all the while, from 1962 onwards, there was much dissatisfaction among urban people WITHIN THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY. These were people who’d travelled abroad and attracted by the brights lights and big cities of their neighbors. And they wanted a change in policies. On Mao’s side were young people who wanted China to continue its own unique journey, who saw the desire for personal wealth as a vice. They also thought, correctly, that those who wanted some of the old ways to return were reactionaries, for the old ways inevitably would bring about great disparity in wealth, promote a dog-eat-dog world, result in prostitution, in people believing in ancient superstitions, etc. Mao’s struggle to wipe out the old was not necessarily all that was old – that was a charge by his enemies – but the vices that he’d seen before when he was a young man. But the very idea of building the new without the old, something that demanded a total change in mentality, was not something that many party members could accept. Hence the ferocity of the Cultural Revolution.

Most of Mao’s Red Guards were young, inexperienced, idealistic students. These were no match for their enemies in the CCP, who would often put around THEIR own armband and called themselves “Red Guards.” A lot of violence were committed by these fake Maoists – which prompted a commentator to mention about “using the name of Mao to go against Mao.” But the number of deaths was never in the hundreds of thousands. Mao’s order, after all, was to “bombard the headquarters!” In other words, his enemies were within the Communist Party, and if we divide them into two roughly equal sides there was hardly a couple of millions on each side (like all conflicts, most would stand at the sidelines). Moreover, most people don’t deal with guns, and the deaths mentioned even in the West were often stuff like beatings with sticks and so on. As usual, the West and their proxies would inflate the numbers, and in this some in the present leadership would even support as justification for their present oligarchical rule.

Deng’s revision of history found much support in the West: Time magazine pronounced him as China’s greatest leader. Zhou Enlai, when asked about what he thought about the French Revolution, said “it was too early to tell.” Whether the present move to capitalism is really that wonderful remains to be seen. Much of the “success” of the new regime was accomplished on the backs of the poor. As I said before, a couple of years ago I’d even suggested on some websites a new guerilla war against the present CCP. Since then, the leadership has been focusing on helping the peasants who were and still are most responsible for the rise of New China. We just have to wait and see.

I’ve taken this opportunity to provide an alternative view of China’s history. Part of the idea is to give an inkling as to how important the rice bowl is to China. For most of the past century, rice was a luxury for the average Chinese, which is why older Malaysians of Chinese ancestry might remember the slap on their faces if they dropped even a speck of the grain. Let not any Chinese tell me he’ll rather go without food than free speech. I’m not impressed. I agree, however, that China can now afford both food and free speech. It will improve in due time, I hope. +++

Mar 09

The execution of a Britain in China for Drug Smuggling raises some interesting questions – including Britain’s integrity and significant lessons for Indian politicians.

Recently the news was packed with what they called the execution by the Chinese Government of a ‘mentally ill’ Britain. He was caught carrying 4 kgs of Heroin in China. His family (surprise surprise!) said that he was mentally ill. And then human rights groups, which are always more than ready to jump in on denouncing China, picked it up.
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Feb 13

Going along with my intention to write about things that are lighter during this New Year’s season, I’d like to share with you an article I came across Time magazine today. The article is titled Why France’s National Identity Debate Backfired. Here is a short excerpt. Continue reading »

Feb 11

While the Chinese government prefers development over human rights (like freedom of religion and speech), the Indian government, while guaranteeing these rights, neglects development.

Both India and China face the problems of separatism. Indian Naxalite movements and the recent riots and uprisings in Xinjiang and Tibet further highlights the need for respective governments to tackle the issue seriously.
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Jul 15

This is the full session between Niall Ferguson and James Fallows at the recently held Aspen Ideas Festival. Allen had posted excepts and we promised you the complete discussion as soon as it became available. Niall Ferguson had coined the term “Chimerica” to describe the symbiotic relationship between the economies of China and the United States. He currently sees this relationship as being in jeopardy, while James Fallows feels the relationship is far stronger the most realize. This video is slightly over 75 minutes.

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Jun 23

This article was printed in the People’s Daily on June 19th. Since this is a state controlled publication, whatever is published will usually have the blessing of the CCP leadership.

Chinese President Hu Jintao and India PM Manmohan Singh recently appeared together at the BRIC summit in Russia. Things seemed friendly enough at the time. What has changed since then? And why would China have a problem with the Asia Development Bank financing development projects in Arunachal Pradesh? I would think economic development in an area that China considers to be a part of her territory would be viewed by China in a positive manner, as it would be beneficial to the people of that region.

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Jun 22

i38_19379493 Events of the last week in Iran have been widely reported by the world press. Not long before, the press also reported on the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square incident of 1989. Were these two distinct events reported in a similar manner or were they treated as different and unique events? Let’s take a look at each and see what we can find.

1) Who are the good guys and who are the bad guys?

Based on the coverage I’ve seen, both governments were cast as being in the wrong and both protest movements as in the right. In the case of China, the government sent in tanks and used live ammunition to break up a protest movement that was alleged to have turned violent. Most of the reporters in the world press were located in or near the same area, and their reports reflected what occurred in that vicinity. Analyzes of this event in most cases pointed to the government as the culprit and the demonstrators as being victims and responding in a suitable fashion. Is this an accurate assessment? The Chinese government attempted to confiscate film of the event from foreign sources but those attempts were successfully evaded in most instances.

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Apr 01

I was reading an opinion column in the Washington Post that contained information I thought might be of interest to the group. It concerned a BBC World View poll showing how countries view each other, either positively or negatively and the percentages of each. It was interesting to see not only how countries viewed each other, but also how the view a country has of itself can be very different than the actual reality. Per the Post column, “A whopping 92 percent of Chinese surveyed believe that China has a mainly positive influence on the world; whereas a mere 39 percent of people polled in 20 other major countries agree. This was the largest perception gap among the countries’ polled.”

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Mar 29

A week or so ago, in one of the final classes of the fourth year history seminar on Christianity in China that I am currently taking, the professor, in an apparent effort to coax us into some critical thinking, posed these questions; “Did Christianity become a Chinese religion? And if so, when and how did this happen?” The answers that we came up with in class included when the first Chinese person converted to Christianity, when the first independent churches (meaning churches that were not controlled by foreign missionaries) were established, and when Christianity was indigenized (meaning transformed by existing factors in Chinese culture to create a form of Christianity unique to China).
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Mar 20

I have not done any research in writing this post, but I hope that does not detract us from having a vigorous and good discussion here.

In our recent Chinese Nationalism thread, Shane9219 started a discussion on a just released movie relating to the Nankin Massacre.

This got people discussing what the lessons of Nazi and Japanese Aggressions in WWII were. Continue reading »

Sep 15

A Mr. Li sent this essay to the BBC and dared them to publish it. They did. Much thanks to EastSouthWestNorth for providing this English translation (See their post for additional translated reader comments.) Continue reading »

Sep 09

Here’s a bit from a famous poem by a famous colonial-era British author. I’ll put the original and then an updated version, since his English is old and a little hard to understand. It’s from “The Ballad of East and West,” by Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936). Continue reading »

Jul 27

Mainlanders often feel exasperated by constant Western criticism, as if no matter what China does and no matter how much China accomplishes, it’s never good enough in the eyes of Western nations. The poem “Chinese Grievances” (aka “What do you want from us?”) expresses this feeling well. I think what’s shared below will help us better understand this problem.
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Jul 24

This article is a comprehensive look at a few young Chinese nationalists, both inside and outside of China.  I recommend it completely.  If the facts and people presented in this article became recognizable in the West, this blog would (almost) have no reason to exist.  Thanks to FOARP (I believe) for recommending this in an earlier thread.

Jul 17

Despite all of the predictions of doom and concern, I believe the Olympics are already a success.  The WSJ reports world and business leaders are crowding China’s red carpet in an unprecedented way:

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Jul 14

An advertising campaign commissioned by the human rights group Amnesty International has raised flames of anger throughout China. For previous discussions, see ESWN and Danwei.

Wall Street Journal has more details on the backlash, reporting:

Weeks before the Olympics put Beijing and the Games’ corporate backers on the world stage, an advertising heavyweight has stumbled over the divide between how some view China and how the nation views itself…. Word of the human-rights campaign is now spreading through China, and TBWA and Amnesty International are disavowing the ads.

Chinese bloggers, spurred by a report in state-run media of the Amnesty campaign last week, are now calling for a boycott of all TBWA ads, among other measures.

And many in China are indeed very angry. But there are other voices as well; below is a translated internet post from Xinmin Net: (原文):

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Jul 05

Shanghaiist highlighted some interesting news: “selling Chinese-made American flags within Minnesota is a crime punishable by up to 90 days in jail and/or a US$1,000 fine.”

What’s going to be the next, penalizing a bare lapel?

Jul 03

Seems like a simple enough question. Actually… while the question of what it means to be Chinese is very simple, it is all of the numerous, equally valid answers that make the issue complicated. We have to accept that there are different answers for different people.

Here is one answer, translated from a post written by an American-raised Chinese on MITBBS (原贴):

I was eating lunch with a good friend (both a colleague and a classmate) a few days ago. He’s a true Englishman, having lived in England from birth through university. Although he’s now attending school with me in the United States, he naturally does so with the identity of an Englishman. Whereas I, as an ethnic Chinese person raised in the United States, have in his eyes been categorized as an “American”. And I will often correct him by saying “I’m Chinese”. This time, when the topic popped up again, he laughed and asked: “From your point of view, what is a Chinese person?”

I believe “Chinese” has three different meanings.

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Jun 25

“True Pride” – Time magazine

Written by: Buxi | Filed under:media | Tags:,
245 Comments » newest

Ah, wonderful article published in Time. Of course, I’m biased as her perspectives very much mirror mine. If only we could convince Ms. Liu to submit an article for us once in a while… I’m tempted to paste the entire article here, I find it that compelling. Instead, you can read it here: Time – True Pride.

Money quotes:

Just a few weeks ago, the west’s view of china was dominated by thuggish torch guards, hypersensitive nationalists and a repressive government. But since the earthquake in Sichuan, the immense state-led rescue effort and the outpouring of charity from the Chinese people has taken center stage. Has the country really changed that much? Not really. The two phenomena on display — nationalism and compassion — are related facets of the vast, multidimensional nation that China is. When it comes to my homeland, I feel them both.

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May 07

– written by Tang Buxi, May 7th 2008

The debate over the Internet lynch mob’s attack of Wang Qianyuan continues. Roland at ESWN brings us this exchange between one of Grace Wang’s supporters at Duke and members of the Chinese community. Grace Wang’s self-stated goal was to help the two sides “communicate”, but the final results show that hasn’t happened.

Unfortunately, many in the West continue to conflate the Internet mob’s behavior with Chinese nationalism at large. The truth is, the two are not directly related. As a proud Chinese nationalist who “defended” the Olympic Torch, I too am absolutely appalled by the Chinese Internet mob.

As far as Wang Qianyuan’s rough treatment being used to criticize those of us who love China… enough is enough. If the verbal attack on Wang Qianyuan suggests something is wrong with Chinese nationalism, then what does the physical attack on Jin Jing in Paris suggest? That something is fundamentally wrong with French liberalism?

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