TFF Associates & Themes Blog

Archive for the ‘China’ Category

By Jonathan Power

May 20th 2014.

Who makes the law of the sea as China and Vietnam clash over China moving an oil rig close to an island only 25 miles from the mainland of Vietnam?

One would hope that China which has ratified the Law of the Sea Treaty which has, among its other virtues, an arbitrating court for such disputes, would seek international, but disinterested arbitration. It refuses to.

Has this got something to do with the fact that the US has not ratified the Treaty? The Chinese don’t say so explicitly, but if the world’s one and only superpower refuses to sign up why should China pay the Treaty due regard? Is that what China is thinking? It is not a very good reason, but conceivably an understandable one. Read the rest of this entry »

By Johan Galtung

Washington is working hard to reconquer slipping world hegemony; in the Anglo-American tradition assuming that No. 2–this year maybe No. 1 economically–is an enemy, instead of deepening cooperation.

In addition to military confrontation, NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization)-AMPO (Japan-US Security Treaty) against SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) over Crimea-Ukraine, economic exclusion; isolating China like they try to isolate Russia over Ukraine. Together in SCO, with new ties being spun daily in the budding Eurasia and giga gas deals in the making, “isolation” of the most populous and largest countries in the world seems out of touch with reality.

Bordering on the Asian sub-continent and the Islamic world most of them might actually lean toward China-Russia, or prefer being open to “isolators” and “isolated” alike. Read the rest of this entry »

By Farhang Jahanpour*

Short e-mail PressInfo version here.

Saudi Military exercises

On 30th April 2014, Saudi Arabia staged its largest-ever military exercises codenamed “Abdullah’s Shield” after the kingdom’s 91-year old ruler and coinciding with the ninth anniversary of his ascension to the throne. The exercises involved 130,000 Saudi troops and showcased some of the latest weapons purchased by the kingdom from the United States and China, including the Chinese CSS-2 intermediate-range ballistic missiles with a range of 2,650 kilometers (1,646 miles) which are capable of carrying nuclear warheads. The Chinese version of these missiles is already equipped with nuclear warheads. This was the first time that these missiles had been seen in public in Saudi Arabia.

Crown Prince Salman presided over the exercises, which were also watched by a number of prominent foreign guests, including King Hamad of Bahrain and more pointedly by Gen. Raheel Sharif, the Pakistani chief of the army Staff. There have been persistent rumors over many decades that in return for Saudi funding of the Pakistani nuclear weapons’ program, Pakistan had committed to provide nuclear warheads for CSS-2 missiles, should Saudi Arabia decide to have them. Earlier in the year when Prince Salman visited Pakistan, he personally invited Gen. Sharif to be his guest at the exercises. Pakistani media stressed the point that Gen. Sharif had gone to Jeddah “on the invitation of Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud to witness the military exercise…” (1)

With the exception of Bahrain’s ruler, none of the other GCC rulers watched the exercises. The guests included the crown prince of the UAE, the prime minister of Jordan and military commanders from some GCC states, but Qatar pointedly did not send any representatives. This was yet another sign of a growing rift between Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

A unified GCC Command and Monetary Union

At the GCC summit held in Kuwait in December 2013, the Saudis called for a unified GCC military command to have 100,000 forces, half of which would be contributed by the Saudis. (2) However, other GCC members opposed the idea as they saw it as a way of consolidating Saudi domination of other GCC states and affirming Saudi Arabia’s position as the big brother. Many smaller GCC states value their independence, and while they would like to cooperate with other GCC members, they do not wish to be absorbed into a unified military alliance as junior partners. Oman openly expressed its opposition to the proposal and Qatar and Kuwait also followed suit. Read the rest of this entry »

By Johan Galtung

China Three Gorges University, Yichang, 23 Apr 2014

A great honor to open the 11th university cooperation conference of N.E.W.S–North-East-West-South—founded in 1993 at the Freie Universität, Berlin by S.P. Park.

Classical university cooperation across borders has professors teaching in one country students from other countries. Thus, when Copenhagen ruled Denmark-Norway 1397-1814 Norwegians studied at the University of Copenhagen, founded in 1479. The University in Oslo came in 1811, but the asymmetry continued; some of it necessary and useful, but not ideal. Missing was equity, “I learn from you, you from me”; missing was empathy, “You learn about me, I about you”. The teaching country is superior in power, shaping the minds in the learning country. But the learning country learns about the deeper features of the teaching country, not vice versa.

A colonial relation. The colonialist leader, England – also in Scotland-Wales-Ireland – imports raw students for processing at huge fees, and exports English as patented commodity with no processing rights. Major industries both; but learning nothing about the world. Of course old knowledge must flow from those with more to those with less, even if professors often exaggerate their own importance: students may learn more together and by self-study–maybe 10%-40%-50%. But professors monopolize exams and diplomas, so better absorb well. Read the rest of this entry »

By Johan Galtung

Nanjing University Conference

A Chinese proverb: better than giving a starving person a fish is teaching her to fish. So, not only solutions but how to solve conflicts: in the East China Sea between China and Japan over Diaoyu-Senkaku and between Korea and Japan over Dockdo-Takeshima; and in the South China Sea between China-Taiwan and Philippines-Vietnam-Malaysia-Brunei over the Nansha-Spratly islands. However, China-Taiwan can here be seen as one party with the same claims, and China has agreed to deal with ASEAN-Association of Southeast Asian Nations collectively, not with only four of the ten member states bilaterally. In short: China vs ASEAN.

The goals in these bilateral conflicts–conflict=incompatible goals! – is state sovereign rights not over mainlands but is-lands – essentially over their EEZs, exclusive economic zones 200 nautical miles from the coast base–to exploit live and non-live resources; fish, hydrocarbons, minerals. And sovereignty over a 12-mile zone–with air space–excluding others, their shipping lanes and flights. Read the rest of this entry »

By Johan Galtung

From Osaka, Kyoto

Japan could have been a leading world power today.

Not a 19th century colonial-imperial-military power, but a peace power like Switzerland, only much bigger. If its political leaders had embraced the peace constitution with Article 9 – finally nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize – depriving Japan of the right to war with the same enthusiasm of its population. A recent public opinion poll showed 2/3, 63%-64% opposing collective defense as well as revision of A9.

It is not that A9 – which is against war, not for peace – is perfect. Betrayed by politicians “interpreting” and used as a comfortable sleeping pillow by the peace movement people, two solid pillars should have been added, like defensive defense and positive peace. Read the rest of this entry »

By Jonathan Power

Beijing, April 8th 2014

The widespread perception that China is or will become soon an aggressive, expansionist power is simply wrong. It is propaganda, rather than fact, a kind of right-wing agitprop.

Far from being an aggressive power, China is a defensive one, and has long been so. It is the one who has been attacked and invaded – by Britain, France, the US and Japan. These days China is too integrated into the world economy and too much in hock to its massive savings invested in the bonds of America and Europe to be anything but defensive.

That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have an urge to bring Taiwan into the mainland’s fold or that it will not protect itself against territorial losses – including Tibet, Xinjiang and a number of islands in the South China and East China seas. Some Western politicos may quarrel with China about this (apart from Xinjiang), but China has a case for each. (But on the sea issue it should go along with the Philippines’ request for arbitration by the judges of the court established by the Law of the Sea Treaty.)

China feels that the large deployment of the US navy close its waters plus the Obama Administration’s “tilt” towards Asia, plus the US’s defence relationships with China’s neighbours are a challenge to its security and sovereignty. It rightly feels encircled. Read the rest of this entry »

By Jonathan Power

Beijing, April 1st 2014

Both Russia and China feel themselves under threat from the US – and their people are clearly behind their governments on this.

Not without reason. Nato has pushed itself up to Russia’s borders. China feels encircled by US naval deployments armed with nuclear weapons in the East China and South China seas together with the US’s wide network of defence relationships with China’s neighbours. If it came to war the US could incinerate many Chinese cities before China realized it was under attack and could launch its own modest armoury of nuclear missiles.

China may be a capitalist state now but many of its views are still hostage to old time Marxist views which leads many to think that the West seeks to exploit the rest of the world. This leads them to conclude that as China rises the US will feel compelled to resist- ironically a conclusion which many conservative Western analysts share.

The balance of power is beginning to shift in China’s favour. It has been able to redeploy forces, once in the north aimed at Russia, to other parts of China. It is increasing its defence budget rapidly, albeit from a low base. However, it spends only 2% of its national income on defence as against the US’s 4.7% and its spending is only one fifth of America’s. Read the rest of this entry »

By Jonathan Power
Dateline: Beijing.
Date: March 18th 2014.

In 1913, following the overthrow of the last emperor, citizens walked, pedalled or rickshawed to the polling stations- although opium smokers, Buddhists and policemen were forbidden from voting. In the annals of the 2,500 years of Chinese civilization it is the one and only time the Chinese have voted in a national election.

Under Mao Zedong, the communist leader who overthrew this Nationalist government, any pretence of voting was given short shrift. Politics was outlawed and would-be dissidents severely punished. Only at the top level of Chinese politics – in the ruling politburo – were votes taken. Indeed, on some occasions, Mao was outvoted.

But once he was dead some of the leadership of the communist party did want to see a loosening up. There was what Bao Tong, personal aide of deposed Communist Party chief, Zhao Ziyang, called a “freedom faction”. For example, in 1995 politburo member, Tian Jiyun, called for direct elections for government officials. Politburo standing committee (the top organ of the party) member, Li Ruihuan, called for partial media privatization. There were others.

Deng Xiaoping, an outcast under Mao, who became the dominant leader shortly after Mao’s death, warned in 1980 of the dangers of “bureaucracy, over-concentration of power, patriarchal methods, life tenure in leading posts and various privileges”. Voting, albeit very tightly controlled, was introduced within the party. Read the rest of this entry »

By Jonathan Power

The West, the US especially, has got itself into a fretful mood over the rise of China. Quite unnecessarily so. The Chinese growth rate is slowing. As a BBC commentator said today, reviewing this week’s government-issued statistics, China never will hit double digit growth again. Glitzy Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu and their like, where growth is still well over 10% a year, make up only a part of China’s economy.

Much of the country has an income per head more akin to Ecuador. Read the rest of this entry »