I think it is a fairly common phenomenon in China for foreigners to get angry and make snide remarks when we hear the government make comments about how they will have a peaceful rise to world power or how they will be number one by 2050. I must admit something in me shutters when I hear it. But recently I have started to think about it in a new way.
I love history and I have been reading Chinese and Russian history for years. One thing that stands out is that China and Russia have been made the bogy man by Western Europe and the US for the most part of the last two hundred years. From the great game in Central Asia to the Boxer Rebellion of 1900, western history has demonized eastern empires.
You never see documentaries about the Russians taking Paris, but rather we always see the heroic battle of Waterloo. You do not hear about the British conquest of Tibet, but rather about the evil Red Guards and the sacking of Lhasa. The twentieth century has been no kinder than the nineteenth century. Marxism and Communism have continued to drawn lines that have created years of distrust, war, and misunderstanding.
This year I have been shaking my head a lot. It has been interesting to me that Americans have just recently started to have more of a public debate on US foreign policy abroad. What a joke. Most Americans feel that things starting going bad only a couple of years ago with headlines about Basra and Kabul. Worst of all, only a few people are questioning the right to export democracy and seem more worried about every member of Al Qaeda swimming across the Atlantic and attacking the US. We have become a nation of sheep being herded by scaremongers.
Sure the US has done some good things in the world, I cannot debate that. The US has had periodic lapses of selfishness and greed and done some good things, but generally speaking US foreign policy is need based. If they see a need, they are willing to help, no benefit, no help.
Where do we get it from and where did we learn this from? I would argue that this Empire attitude goes back not to Vietnam, not to Korea, but rather it is a borrowed strategy from the playbook of “our best friends†the British.
The old Empire playbook reads like Sunzi’s Art of War on how to wage war on all continents in the name of Empire. They look so docile and friendly now, but read the histories of India, Afghanistan, and Tibet to name a few. The British aren’t so cuddly if you are on piece of land they want.
So are these isolated incidents? Is it just the US and Britain? No, it’s every European country that has had visions of Empire. From Caesar and Alexander to Hitler and Napoleon, they have all wanted to make the world, or part of it, theirs and furthermore did little to really try to understand the culture of the people they were invading.
So what’s my point you may be asking. My point is that many foreigners living in China walk around pointing fingers at the Chinese and talk about how great and fair their countries are, and how China isn’t.
Well I would say that to some degree it might be better, but it’s probably that we have all just gotten so used to our own countries problems that we make excuses for them, or worse don’t think they exist. I say if our countries cannot be better, even though most of them are democracies that hold elections and support free speech, how can we criticize the Chinese for the same problems? At least they can honestly say that they can’t do anything about it.
Sometimes I am jealous of the Chinese being able to say that they cannot make change. It’s a joke and a lie that we were raised to believe we can do anything if we put our minds to it, because some things are out of reach and that’s just how it is. Life isn’t a Hollywood movie.
It’s embarrassing to be an American sometimes with so many people on their moral high horses preaching about values, religion, and human rights. I say let the Chinese rule the world since they want to so badly. Then we can just sit back, relax, and let them sort everything out, and best of all , catch all the flak.
In fact I would say that the only thing bad or really different that would come out of a world ruled by China is bad internet connections and a lot of bad kung fu movies about emperors. I say let the revolution begin!
I like movies about kung fu fighting emperors! 😉
To be honest though, I’m pretty certain Canada (as a nation, not as a colony) has never had imperial ambitions – unless you count Hans Island – so, not sure if I can relate on a personal level.
I do agree that a combination of homesick, alienation, and general fuckupedness in China lends itself to most foreigners (myself included) having rose-tinted glasses when viewing their homeland.
That said, I’ve met a lot more Americans that would say a bad word about their country than I have Chinese. Perhaps you’re right, and perhaps having the situational justification to rely on “没办法” more would be a good thing.
Oh Canada, the traditional British cannon fodder. You are right, they are the peaceful ones. I have a lot of respect for them, well except for Quebec, they are a bit Imperial. A little too French I guess.
I gotta hand it to them, they even give land back to the natives. I mean wow! In this world that never happens.
I guess its a mixture of meibanfa and the fact that Yanks can be hypocritical at times.
“Someday China will be number one.” I’ve been hearing this phrase a lot lately from Chinese people. I wonder, what are the motivations behind it?
Here are some possible motivations, in order of believability:
-Inferiority complex
-Justify continued CCP rule
-Thirst for power
-Manifest Destiny
Are there any realistic non-negative motivations? I can think of a few but I can’t bring myself to put them down because I’m not naive enough to believe they are true.
And what are possible motivations for America staying at number one?
-Superiority complex
-Thirst for power
-Manifest Destiny
As above, are there any realistic non-negative motivations? I can think of a few but I can’t bring myself to put them down because I’m not naive enough to believe they are true.
Kevin, spoken like the Buddha on a mountain.
For the US we have to add:
Justify continued Neo-conservative rule in the name of God and Democracy
I thought about adding that one, but I decided against it as it would be irrelevant if the neo-cons lose the 2008 presidential election and I’m thinking more long term.
NEVER talk like that!!!
The safety of every God-loving, freedom-loving American is at stake when you look to the 2008 election.
If Democracts get in power again not only will the wrath of Al Qaeda come down on us, but also God. He’ll come back and trust me he will not be happy.
This message brought to you by “Friends of Pat Robertson”.
Ahhhh! I’m sorry! Please, forgiveth me. Let me not blaspheme again the will of the Lord. Emperor Bush, ten thousand years! Neo-con thought, ten thousand years! Have mercy on me.
“I say let the Chinese rule the world since they want to so badly. Then we can just sit back, relax, and let them sort everything out, and best of all, catch all the flak.”
I hope you’re being entirely sarcastic. I think it’s a mistake to compare China’s actions as a regional power to the U.S. and Britain’s actions as superpowers. Minus any significant world opposition, there’s no telling what China might do.
I am being extremely sarcastic, but also deeply offended at the direction US foreign policy has been leaning in previous years.
Also how the religious right and scare-mongers are leading so many people into believing its the end of the world if we don’t subscribe to their causes at home and abroad.
I remember a time when I did not feel bad to be an American abroad. We had our problems with foreign policy, but it wasn’t so bad. Now, it is more and more embarrassing. The easy answer would to say that it is because of G Wubya, but the sad truth is it is not his fault, it’s all the idiots that voted for him not once, but twice who are to blame.
I agree with you all the way that U.S. foreign policy is off the mark, but I don’t feel a government that has attacked Korea, Tibet, Vietnam, India and Taiwan (annexing territory in some of these cases) and has supported governments like Pol Pot and Kim Il-Sung is in any imminent position to improve upon the U.S. I’m not insisting that the U.S. remain #1 forever. I just want a better replacement.
I totally agree, I wrote this post to shake thigs up a little, but to reply I might remind you that the US has backed people like Saddam, bin Laden and Pinochet.
The good old CIA has a great list of previous friends.
Annexing the US has done well too. Hawaii, Texas, most of the Southwest.
I guess I felt like I was hearing that people we too accepting of what the US has done or is doing in the recent past, so I decided to see what people were thinking by writing a anti-US rant with a satirical ending about China.
@Sean, well said. I think the simple truth is, any massive imperial (and by this I mean a country that has extensive financial, personal, and resource interest in a web of other nations that they offer “protection, trade, etc.” to) nation is going to chafe people of said nations.
Every country that has created an “empire” of nations has done it and I doubt this will change. Often the good that these fatherly-nations bring to the area are forgotten in the patriotic struggle to maintain sovereignty.
I am hot and cold on this diplomacy. It’s far to complicated to just say “can’t we all just live and let live” or “a country like that needs our help to rise up from their squaller.” Like all things in life, there’s just no easy answer.
I nominate Canada as the next world super-power, and likely the only people to raise issue are Quebecers and baby seals…
To be honest I could totally get behind Canada as the next ruler of the world if less Canadians thought that ALL Americans are stupid.
Some people talk about South of the Border like it is a third world country or like everyone is a G.W. apostle.
As I said before I think it is totally awesome that they have given land back to the indigenous
peoples.
åŠ æ‹¿å¤§ä¸€ä¸‡å²! 打倒美å¸å›½ä¸»ä¹‰!
大刀å‘美国鬼å头上ç 去!
(Mao would be so proud of me!)
I also hate that my compatriots largely believe many Americans are complete morons. It’s not to say that most aren’t… it’s just that most Canadians are too.
Canadians endlessly tell jokes about how American’s don’t even know we’ve a Prime Minister (not a President), and that there aren’t 12 months of winter just north of Toronto.
The truth is, the ONLY reason we know a damn thing about the US (therefore fueling the ‘they’re so stupid’ sentiment) is because we’re force-fed US television our entire lives; whereas the only thing that Canada’s TV industry has put out that was worth exporting was Degrassi – and that’s a stretch.
Ask your average Canadian who the President of France is… or England for Christ’s sake… and watch them squirm.
Of all things that aren’t consistent in the world (including my damn in-China bowels), the one that is would be people – no matter what race, nationality or creed – are generally idiots.
but I don’t feel a government that has attacked Korea, Tibet, Vietnam, India and Taiwan (annexing territory in some of these cases) and has supported governments like Pol Pot and Kim Il-Sung is in any imminent position to improve upon the U.S.
Um, didn’t the US attack Vietnam? And to boot we supported the Khmer Rouge after they were ousted in the 1980s.
This isn’t defending the present Chinese government, but it is questioning whether we in the US consistently underrate just how long our foreign policy has been going wrong.
I think that was my main point. I think that Westerners, and Americans more in the last 50 years, have gotten too good at forgiving their governments for doing things that we grill other countries for doing.
Imperialism and Nationalism are alive and well, they have just changed with time. Before it was the British Raj, now it is a US “Liberation” of Iraq. Nationalism is harder to pin, but it is out there.
In this assessment I too am not defending the Chinese right to ascend to number one, but I do question the motives of the Western Democracies.
Freedom is sweet! — peasants in Yuri’s Revenge
Hi, Sean!
I’m a Chinese reader of your friends’&your blogs. I find this blog of yours(What if the…)very interesting so I have translated it into Chinese, and have sent it to a popular Chinese BBS, together with your original text. Hmmm, till now it has received many feedbacks, most of which focus on some translative problems, anyway.
I’m a researcher at Southern China Jimei University. All students here are completely convinced China will be #1 in no time.
*part of the original comment has been edited due to the irrelevant content and commerical nature of the link.*
Hi Sean:
Having read through your article, very much impressed by the analytics;
I am a mainland Chinese in Canton now and working for a US firm;
I would like to admit that China may have given you such an impression as a healthy growing and booming economy and it seems to be just a matter of time for this country to pass through US in terms of economical figures and inherit the commanding stick left by the it;
But I really think that’s quite superfical and I personally do not think this surpassing is likely to happen given enough time;
Internally the biggest challenge China now faces is a rotting political infrastructure which leads to enormous social debacles and potential tumults; The government’s power is not confined and the market is not guided by a healthy commercial legislation system but by some sub-rules which contradicts with the equality on which all business are to be built and manoeuvored with; Think about a balloon, the skin refers to the political infrastructure, and the air we pump into it is the economical body; Along with the commence of economy boom in early 1980s the previous slack skin becomes more and more tightened as we pump in more and more air, while eventually it will shatter into pieces due to unability to sustain such strong pressure; Russia and eastern Europe has already shown us the outcome of such collapse in early 1990s;
The infrastrature are encountering such problems like lack of proper pension system, large scale urbanization and increasingly dispersion of wealth distribution between urban and rural areas, giant bubbles in real estate market and stock market along with the absense of a mingled and balanced investment market, soaring in medical expense pricings, etc. All these indicators lead to the ineffectiveness of the legal system and eventually retrieves to the political system of current 1 party composition;
Thus we can predict that when the skin cannot bear any more air pumped in, it will pass the threshold and nothing but an enormous recession awaits us by then;
Also externally, China is facing serious energy shortages, which is also one of the crucial problems Germans have been facing before the WWI, and also a deciding factor of them starting that war; But I do think China is not likely to rage a war against other countries over this because uniting folks cross this nation given current conditions of so many unrevealing internal conflicts’ existance is nothing but mission impossible.
Also the export industry China depends on most is dwindling through the soaring of labour cost and strict monetary policies, thus you will probably see the US general merchandise market overwhelmed by Vietnamese products instead of labelled as “Made In China” with in decades;
I would rather take a more conservative stand in predicting China’s future, I would rather believe that we will encounter serious internal conflicts along with external pressure from the international community within forseeable future, and whether to survive that crisis should be the key deciding factor of whether China will take over the world’s command from current US lead, of course all these are based on the assumption of unhappening of the icecaps of Artica melting up and Polar bears migrating south to eat us all.
What if China doesn’t care about shared commercialism or future trade with the west, or even about absorbing us? What if Chinese Government sees the only way for World Domination is to wipe us out? What if they promise their people better EVERYTHING,….but only after every Westerner is removed from the equation and his or her lands and natural resources are taken by the Chinese government and redistributed among the Chinese citizens? What if the Chinese Government’s plan for the U.S. is a giant vacant depot of land that they can mine all the natural resources out of to ensure their continued dominance over the world? What if we are just in their way? What if the ” transcendental issue of the 21st century” is China and Russia fighting over the “Dead American’s Land.” Ask yourself…. if YOUR government told you right now that China was gearing up for an attack, that the plan was total annihilation and every single ounce of our military personnel around the world and a re-instated draft would be the only way to even begin to combat it, would YOU vote to go on the offense? Could we even beat China on the offense? Remember, we are still talking about a communist nation…..the gap between the rich and the poor in China is so incredibly vast it makes the poor in America look like kings. The only way it’s even possible for the Chinese Supremacy Machine to continue growing with the grim reality of financial inequality of her citizens is its sheer numbers…..I mean even if they did absorb us, are you really ready to just be a number? Are you really ready for The United Communist States of China?
@Our focus is in the wrong place: Are there really people this retarded? Really?
Interesting. All this self loathing seems to be a Western illness. My suggestion: get over it! The USA, & Europe have done plenty wrong, but we have also done plenty of good for the world. We have also learned a lot in the process. Perfect? no! Good? Too often not. But i still believe in us, much more than the Chinese, and their current record of human rights abuse,and animal cruelty. There comes a time when it is right & necessary as our defeated enemies from WW2 learned: FORGIVE YOURSELF! Apparently many of us have still been unwilling to do that.
There’s nothing wrong with a bit of self loathing. It’s healthy to be able to know your own faults and to learn from them. Despite the fact the U.S. has probably been the most benign hyper power in modern history, I agree with Sean that the West, or at least the U.S. engage in too little introspection these days. We put our faith in the free press – when any student of history will tell you free press merely means the press is free to print anything – sometime (oh heck, often) not necessarily the truth. The good thing is that with a free press you can probably piece together the truth, but it takes time and effort and, well, most of us are too lazy. Remember how many Americans believed Saddam had something to do with 9-1-1 (I think one poll had 70%)? Could Dubiya have pulled that off without some help of our free press?
Goblintrain suggests that the U.S. and Europe have done plenty wrong but have learned a lot in the process? Have they? If we learned from Vietnam, why are we in Iraq? If you suggest it’s for a strategic reason, then we really haven’t learned squat, have we? But then given the state of education in most of these United States I don’t really expect anyone to learn much of anything. I doubt 90% of grades 9-12 can point to Vietnam on a map. What’s even sadder is that 85% probably can’t locate Iraq. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t get on our high horse and lecture others – it’s the American Way!
To the Chinese posters – the best way to meet those American or European lectures that smack of moral hypocrisy is simply reply:
“Pot meet Kettle”, or
“Those who live in glass houses”
These short replies save you a lot of time and energy, it’s an uber-appropriate response, and your lecturer may feel you have one up on them and will cease and desist for fear of being pwned.
No worries. Just remember that when Chinese tourists visit the U.S., they make the same condescending remarks about America too….racism, drug abuse, high crime, no gun control, police brutality, human rights abuses, too many white people, etc.
So, it’s the same for everyone.
When i was a child 30 odd years ago my first real memory of China was a newspaper article about how Chinese police profiled & then publicly executed the top 50 officials at a refrigeration plant. Call us illiterate, stupid,, or whatever you want to. You are the revisionists of world history when you try to say that this kind of behavior is progree for the rest of us. What you are advocating ispure brutality. Rome never admitted to any wrong doing, no matter how heinous her crimes really were. The USA & Britain, & France all make that unprecedented leap by admitting they made mistakes. Yet what do they receive in turn from people like yourself? No penance will ever be harsh enough, no heart will ever be warm to these peoples! China will never rule the world because regardless of how she may try, she can never govern the conscience of all mankind, much less her own counttry!
China is the grandfather of isolationalist. The spread of Chinese culture influence (family, education, gentleman’s mannerism,totalitarianism) was through thousands of years. The recent interests on other lands is because of survival and bitter experiences of the recent past. You really have to pay them to have them nosy in other people’s affairs. So it is possible that America will be the muscle guy, China will the the brain and money behind for the times to come. That is your Chinese century.
My dear foreign friends,
Did Chinese gov or Chinese people ever have the objective to change your life style or your ideology? Absolutely not.
So in what sense will China “rule” the world? In the sense of natural resources. Each US family has at least a car, uses dish washer/air conditioner/tumble dryer. Car requires steel and fuel. Electric car still requires natural resources for that electricity. Dish washer/air con/tumble dryer are all greedy energy consumers. Does the god privilege the US and dictate that Chinese people should forever live a frugal life? Then we have to disagree with the god.
1.3 billion Chinese population have the right to pursue 1 car & 1 dish washer & 1 tumble dryer & 1 air conditioner per family, whether you like it or not.
By no means do I wish to change your ideology. You believe whatever you want to believe.
But are you against 1.3 billion Chinese population pursuing 1 car & 1 dish washer & 1 tumble dryer & 1 air conditioner per family?
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