Tag: China

The 4th Ideology

Very, very few in the West will understand the significance of the historic resolution passed by the CPC at its most recent plenary session:

The Chinese Communist Party has passed a “historical resolution”, cementing Xi Jinping’s status in political history.

The document, a summary of the party’s 100-year history, addresses its key achievements and future directions.

It is only the third of its kind since the founding of the party – the first was passed by Mao Zedong in 1945 and the second by Deng Xiaoping in 1981.

It was passed on Thursday at the sixth plenary session, one of China’s most important political meetings.

As only the third Chinese leader to have issued such a resolution, the move aims to establish Mr Xi as an equal to party founder Mao and his successor Deng.

“Just like the previous two resolutions, [this resolution] will play an important role in helping to unite the theory, will and action of the party – to achieve future progress and in realising the second centenary goal and the great Chinese dream of rejuvenation,” senior party official Qu Qingshan said at a press conference on Friday.

What this action signifies is that China’s ideology, which has not been Maoist since 1978, is officially no longer Dengist either. This third adaptation marks the triumph of the brilliant Wang Huning, China’s chief ideologist and the architect of the new Xiist ideology that rejects the Western-influenced Dengist economics-first approach that has been the official party line since Mao’s successor rejected doctrinaire Marxist-Leninism and publicly declared “to get rich is glorious” in 1978.

The CPC has historically recognized three political cultures:

  • Traditional Confucianism
  • Marxist-Leninism as interpreted by Mao
  • Communo-Corporatism as interpreted by Deng

The globalists of the neo-liberal world order loved Dengism and were intimately involved in its formation. Consider how George Soros described his own involvement with “the bold reform agenda” and Deng’s conception of “China’s place in the world.”

Mr. Xi came to power in 2013, but he was the beneficiary of the bold reform agenda of his predecessor Deng Xiaoping, who had a very different concept of China’s place in the world. Deng realized that the West was much more developed and China had much to learn from it. Far from being diametrically opposed to the Western-dominated global system, Deng wanted China to rise within it. His approach worked wonders. China was accepted as a member of the World Trade Organization in 2001 with the privileges that come with the status of a less-developed country. China embarked on a period of unprecedented growth. It even dealt with the global financial crisis of 2007-08 better than the developed world.

Xi’s Dictatorship Threatens the Chinese State, George Soros, 14 August 2021

However, the highly influential Wang pointed out the flaws inherent to the third political culture in his famous text known as The Structure of China’s Changing Political Culture:

The bourgeois revolution in the West promoted the basic values of freedom, equality, fraternity, and democracy, and on this basis a political culture evolved over the succeeding centuries. The ancient Chinese core values emphasizing the respective roles and duties of ruler, subject, father, and son similarly dominated the political culture at that time. But there are no core values in China’s most recent structure. This lack has multiple meanings: it may mean that the value itself has yet to evolve; it may mean that the value exists but has not universally entered political culture; and it may mean that we do not have vehicles to carry out the transmission of values. Since 1949, we have criticized the core values of the classical and modern structures, but have not paid enough attention to shaping our own core values. In and of itself, Marxism transcended the Western rule-based worldview, but in China, which never possessed that worldview, the results of the adoption of Marxism were not always positive. Therefore, to forge core values today means grasping the overall process of transformation from a culturally oriented political culture to an institutionally oriented political culture, and to choose core values conducive to this transformation.

The Structure of China’s Changing Political Culture, Wang Hunin

What the elevation of Xiism – Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, to be specific – to equal status with Maoism (Mao Zedong Thought) and Dengism (Deng Xiaoping Theory) signifies is the complete rejection of what presently passes for “democracy” as well as the neo-liberal world order. That is why the international corporations are fleeing China, why the chief executives of major Chinese corporations are stepping down in disgrace, and why globalist figures are furiously denouncing Xi as the latest “new Hitler”. Like Vladimir Putin, and unlike Donald Trump, Xi Jinping has successfully overcome the agents of the neo-liberal world order in defense of his nation.

This official declaration marks the completion of the rejection of the globalists that first became apparent in 2015, when Xi publicly declined to provide what was intended to be a symbol of Sino-Globo unity by giving the offspring of Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg an honorary Chinese name.

Nationalism is rising, in China as elsewhere, and this is a development to be celebrated by nationalists everywhere. While the Christian West is not China, and while China is not necessarily a friend to the Christian West, neither is China an enemy. To the contrary, China is now the most formidable enemy of the ancient evil that has subjugated the Christian West. And what is the enemy of one’s enemy, if not a friend?

DISCUSS ON SG

Hitting Them Where it Hurts

China is going directly after the wallets of the wealthy and well-connected Taipei politicians who seek separation from the mainland.

The Chinese mainland on Friday announced specific measures to punish diehard secessionists from the island of Taiwan, including prohibiting them and their families from entering the mainland and the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions, and restricting their associated institutions from cooperating with organizations and individuals in the mainland for economic benefits, and they will be persecuted for life long for criminal liability.

Experts said the move on Friday is just the beginning to hold secessionists accountable, and shows that the complete reunification of the country is irresistible as the mainland is taking concrete measures on laws to remove obstacles. Those who attempt to split the island of Taiwan from the motherland would have no place to hide, and will face a life-long pursuit for their crimes.

Aside from entry ban, we would not allow the companies or paymasters of these diehard secessionists to profit from Chinese mainland, and will also take other measures to punish them, Zhu Fenglian, spokesperson of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, told a press conference on Friday.

Mainland slaps punishment for diehard Taiwan secessionists, Global Times, 5 November 2021

This is a just and rhetorically effective approach to create pressure for reunification on the leadership of the independence movement. Most of them profit considerably from their business with the mainland, and denying it to them will tend to reduce both their will and their influence while increasing the influence of the friends of the mainland.

After all, if they want separation from the mainland, why should they enjoy any benefits from its massive market? And the warning that they will be held accountable for life means that their future wealth and influence will be completely dependent upon the success of their secession plans.

It’s also evidence that the Chinese leadership has learned that subtlety and soft power can be more useful in some circumstances than overt threats of massive violence.

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Independence is Not Imperialism

The ignorant Chi-Com haters, whose perspective on China is literally 43 years out of date and who stubbornly project their own imperialism on the world’s largest nation, have now managed to completely misunderstand Xi Jinping’s policy of pursuing economic independence:

The Financial Times reported that the head of the U.S. business lobbying agency in China warned that as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) tightens its control of COVID-19, Western executives are withdrawing from the world’s largest consumer market.

Today, as the rest of the world has reopened, American business leaders, including Mr. Ker Gibbs and Alan Beebe, Presidents of the American Chambers of Commerce in Shanghai and Beijing, are warning the CCP that the evacuation of foreigners from China may accelerate.

The British Financial Times also cites a recent survey of 338 American Chamber of Commerce members in Shanghai. The survey shows that more than 70% of companies have difficulty in attracting and retaining foreign talent. “Restrictions related to travel visas,” have become the main issue.

China’s strict entry quarantine policies include the abolition of tax incentives enjoyed by foreigners for decades; the rising cost of living in Chinese cities. Power shortages, power cuts, and increases in electricity prices, along with the CCP’s relentless surveillance, are also essential factors in driving foreign executives to return to their home countries.

China is still conducting a policy of “Zero COVID-19”. Anxious foreigners, uncertain of how long they would be locked up in their houses, quickly fled.

TFI Global points out that the flight of investors from China is due to the strict blockade by COVID-19, government surveillance, and a series of repressive economic policies implemented by the authorities.

Since last November, China has launched an all-out attack against businesses, companies, and entrepreneurs. The technology industry, education and training, private schools, and most private companies are “harvested” by the government. In the face of such anti-trade measures, investors will inevitably flee from China to escape the dictatorship.

Foreigners flee China, the separation is almost complete?, 3 November 2021

This has very little, if anything, to do with “Covid-19”. That’s merely a code word for the international financial regime, in both China and the West. And the self-deportation of foreigners is a feature, not a bug. Literally every nation in the West, beginning with America, would benefit greatly from the same behavior on the part of the foreign peoples who have invaded them. How anyone can look at the ongoing collapse of the USA due to its evil policies of mass immigration, free trade, and free speech and conclude that the failing state provides a functional model worthy of imitation, much less an ideal model that morally requires installation by force, completely mystifies me.

China is voluntarily choosing the fate that was imposed upon Russia by angry neocon imperialists who wished to punish the Putin regime for expelling its elite servants who were financializing and parasitizing the Russian economy. China is doing so because it has seen the way in which the Russian people and the Russian economy have greatly benefited from being expelled from the evil and vampiric neo-liberal world order, which in any event is in the process of collapsing. Hence all the “Great Reset” talk, which is the financial elite’s attempt to succeed itself in the aftermath of their own failure.

Unlike the Boomer-tier China critics, I have read the writings of Lee Kuan Yew, Xi Jinping, and Wang Huning. They are not only far more intelligent than their critics, they are great and admirable men who have taken on incredibly challenging burdens on behalf of their people that bear an almost unfathomable degree of difficulty. Xi and Wang may fail, like Donald Trump, or they may succeed, like Vladimir Putin. But the entire world should wish them well in their endeavors.

China does not seek world dominance any more than Russia does. That is pure projection on the part of people who not only want to rule the world, but believe it is their Satan-given right to do so. When you read stories of Chinese hunger for global domination in the media, consider the fucking source! Both Russia and China simply seek to be powerful enough to rule themselves and keep the evil globalists at bay; both countries have already suffered at their hands and both countries already possess sufficient military power to invade and occupy their neighbors more easily than the USA invaded and occupied Iraq.

What China is doing is exactly what Americans should be doing as a nation, but can’t because they have been the victims of the largest invasion in world history, and because they are demoralized, denationalized, and subjected. And it should be obvious to even the most slow-witted right now that the USA is currently on a path that will, if it is not abandoned, lead to the same horrors that both China and Russia endured in the 20th century.

UPDATE: China experts recognize that China is beginning to utilize its increasingly formidable economic power in pursuit of its geostrategic ends.

Beijing is using legislative power to punish supporters of “Taiwan independence” (again, deliberately undefined) with travel bans and prosecutions. Some people might argue back, “Well, just don’t go to China”- but it’s not as simple as that. On a business and organizational level, this is a move with huge ramifications. If you have a business, you could lose access to the huge Chinese market and never has that been more relevant in Taiwan, whose largest economic and trading partner is China. Both geography and commerce talk.

In addition, China has extradition treaties with 59 countries. While the majority of those are outside the West, this creates a legal reach stretching beyond China’s borders. Certain countries near China are willing to comply with this kind of request due to their own mutual interests in anti-separatism and unrest. Consider, for example, how Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong was banned from both Thailand and Malaysia. This means that vocal supporters of Taiwan who end up blacklisted should not assume they are safe just because they do not have a stake in China or Hong Kong, or wish to go there. Beijing is using long-arm jurisdiction.

DISCUSS ON SG

An Empire in Decline

It might seem a little strange that the Chinese media is still discussing the English empire in terms of decline, given that everyone recognizes the empire “on which the sun never sets” is no more. Except it is apparent that in doing so, they are actually referring to the declining imperial USA, as the Russian media clearly understands.

The United States must come to terms with the reality that it no longer enjoys “military primacy” in the Western Pacific, and confront the “ugly” reality that it may lose a military conflict with China over Taiwan, Graham Allison, professor of government at the Harvard Kennedy School, has warned.

In a piece for The National Interest, Allison pointed to recent analyses on the possibility of war over Taiwan by a number of senior current and former officials, including ex-Vice Joint Chiefs Chairman James Winnefeld and former-CIA Director Michael Morell, who recently concluded that the Chinese military could deliver a fait accompli on Taiwan before Washington even mustered its forces.

Col. Bob Work, former deputy secretary of defence under Barack Obama and Joe Biden, has expressed even greater pessimism, stating publicly (Allison’s paraphrasing) that “in the most realistic war games the Pentagon has been able to design simulating war over Taiwan, the score is eighteen to zero. And the eighteen is not Team USA.”

The reasons for this are twofold, according to Allison. The first, as former Secretary of Defence Jim Mattis said in his 2018 National Defence Strategy, is that the US no longer enjoys its post-Cold War “dominant superiority in every operating domain,” including the ability to “generally deploy our forces when we wanted, assemble them where we wanted, and operate how we wanted. Today, every domain is contested – air, land, sea, space and cyberspace.”

The second, Allison notes, relates to China’s radical advances in its anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities – consisting of everything from anti-ship and anti-air missile systems to long range ballistic and cruise missiles, electronic warfare and interceptor aircraft.

This loss of global imperial hegemony is actually good for Americans, as the rise of the nationalist regional powers increases the chances that Americans will finally begin to recognize that their democracy is a fraud, they no longer rule themselves, and they have not done so for some time now.

One need not be a particular fan of China, Russia, or Iran to observe that their rise is detrimental to America’s enemies.

DISCUSS ON SG

A Dangerous and Ineffective Strategy

A British East Asian specialist appears to be less than confident in Taiwan island’s strategic approach to remaining de facto independent of the mainland.

Taiwan is pursuing a strategy against China that I term “provocation diplomacy.” That is, seeking to deliberately provoke China by driving wedges in Beijing’s relationships with other countries with the aim of procuring support for itself. It’s a strategy that is premised on a public relations blitz. Taipei is seeking to get as many anti-China politicians to visit it, which have included various legislators, most prominently former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott; encouraging direct violations of the One-China policy to forcibly downgrade China’s ties with countries, as has happened with Lithuania; giving direct access to mass media, such as CNN this week, and aggressive social media strategies, all with the goal of gaining more support in provoking Beijing into a response.

That subsequent response from China then often appears threatening or, how the US likes to describe it, “coercive,” which then subsequently rallies more support in Taipei’s favour. The ultimate goal is to undermine China’s red line, or “salami slice” it and make it more politically difficult for Xi Jinping to make the island capitulate on his terms.

However, it also rests on two fundamental assumptions, both of which are dangerous gambles. Firstly, the belief that China will not seriously contemplate military action against Taiwan due to the potential devastating consequences that would flow from it. And secondly, that in such a scenario, the United States would come militarily to Taiwan’s support, meaning the first is less likely to happen. This latter assumption appears to have been encouraged by what appeared to be an ambiguous statement, or gaffe, from Joe Biden last week when he said the US has a “commitment” to defending Taiwan. Media commentary, however, was split on how exactly to interpret this.

As of now, Beijing’s reactions have consisted of blustering a lot and making angry responses towards the countries associated with Taipei’s stunts. China talks a lot about its “red lines” and about enforcing its One-China policy. It also carries out military exercises in the Strait between it and Taiwan but, so far, it has not made any decisive move which will discourage Taipei from its current course.

But that doesn’t mean China will do nothing. Xi Jinping’s confidence in the idea of reunification, as expressed in his keynote speech two weeks ago, comes across as firm, unwavering and unfazed, a different depiction altogether to the fiery state media rhetoric. He did not threaten military action, nor did he give the impression Taiwan was “slipping away” from Beijing, so it might have to resort to desperate measures. Instead, he expressed hope in an inevitable, peaceful, reunification. Yet this all poses more questions than what it answers: how exactly will this happen? How can China achieve this? When?

One thing that should be noted about China is that it invariably chooses the right time to “strike” and has a potency for taking swift and often calculated risks in accordance with its national interests. As one example, Beijing used the West’s distraction over the Covid-19 pandemic, and the social distancing measures that were in place, to impose the national security law in Hong Kong. Previously, the scale of the protests and violence would have made that impossible.

A year on, the protest movement was effectively over, with the leading figures in jail or exiled, and most of the opposition disbanded.

Many of the strategies used by protest leaders in Hong Kong are similar to what Taiwan is doing now. They sought to gain publicity through provoking Beijing, and appealing to the world and the mainstream media to help. Their calculus? That China would institute a violent crackdown to stop them, which would be costly and result in Beijing’s isolation and more US intervention, similar to what Taipei assumes now.

This gives us some clues, if not concrete evidence, of where things will go next.

The contrast between the strategy of the Taiwanese leadership and the strategy of Lee Kwan Yew in guiding Singapore to independence could hardly be more stark. Granted, Yew wanted Singapore to be a part of Malaysia while the ruling DPP does not want Taiwan to be a part of China, but that significant difference notwithstanding, Yew’s wise strategy was guided by a fundamental understanding of the military and demographic weakness of his own position.

The DPP’s strategy appears to be guided, instead, by a delusional pair of false assumptions. This is a preposterous mistake, especially given that Xi Jinping is almost certainly the most friendly Chinese leader with whom the Taiwanese will ever have the chance to negotiate reunification. The empire, divided in 1945, will unite, the only serious questions concern the timing and the terms.

DISCUSS ON SG

The Flight From Taiwan

And so it begins. They can explain it away all they like, but it’s apparent that multinational corporations are beginning to prepare for the island’s reunification with the mainland:

Taiwan chip giant TSMC announced on Thursday plans to build a new factory in Japan to meet long-term appetite for chips and said, near-term, tight supplies will likely continue into 2022 amid booming demand during the COVID-19 pandemic.

TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker and a key supplier to Apple Inc (AAPL.O), said it would set up a chip plant in Japan that will use older chipmaking technology, a segment currently under a severe supply shortage due to robust demand from automakers and tech companies. But production from the plant is only likely to begin by late 2024.

The company and Taiwan in general have become central in efforts to resolve a pandemic-induced global chip shortage, which has forced automakers to cut production and hurt manufacturers of smartphones, laptops and consumer appliances.

This doesn’t mean war in the Straits. In fact, I doubt there will be any need for a war; it’s more likely that Russia will be forced to invade and occupy Ukraine due to the insane neoclown puppet government there. But it does suggest Chinese domination of the semiconductor market.

DISCUSS ON SG

China Bets on Surrender

Now that the USA’s “strategic ambiguity” is no more, China is openly putting pressure on the Taiwanese leadership to prepare for a quick surrender:

The Tsai Ing-wen authority has said that the island will defend itself “to the very last day” if the Chinese mainland attacks. Most people know they are bluffing. A recent Wall Street Journal report quoted several experts as assessing that Taiwan’s military has “poor preparation and low morale”. Also, “adult men in Taiwan don’t actually want to fight”. The article doubted the island would stand much chance against China’s People’s Liberation Army. The report also advised that the Taiwan military could become far more effective by training with the US.

How could it be possible to boost the low morale of the Taiwan military by training with the US army? In 2003, I asked a former soldier in Taiwan “whether the island is able to defend itself if a war breaks out?” He made it very clear that the answer is “no”. I then asked him how long he thinks the island could hold, he answered that, “Maybe dozens of hours.” That was a long time ago. Today, the military capability comparison between the Chinese mainland and the island of Taiwan is completely different from that of 18 years ago.

From my point of view, first of all, the mainland doesn’t want to fight a war. It has the will to safeguard peace and take war as the last resort. Second, the Democratic Progressive Party authorities dare not fight. They are making bluffs, but they know very well that the island’s military forces are weak. They cannot withstand even a single blow. If there is a war, Taiwan will be surely defeated and collapse….

My prediction is that a war in the Taiwan Straits may eventually be avoided. That is when the strong military pressure of the mainland bows down the will of pro-independence forces in Taiwan island. The situation is changing. The goodwill and patience of the mainland is not to be consumed by DPP authorities endlessly. If the Taiwan question escalates so that it can only be solved through military means, the sudden surrender of Taiwan authorities who dare not fight is within everyone’s expectation.

That’s my expectation as well. As the rule of lies has made it ever more clear that nothing that comes out of the mouths of the rulers of the West should be trusted, more and more people around the world are grasping that what we perceived to be reality in the past was never anything more than an illusion meant to cause us to defeat ourselves through fear.

At this point, the only thing protecting Taiwan island is the mainland’s desire to avoid harming the population and the techno-industrial infrastructure.

DISCUSS ON SG

China Refuses to Flex

The Global Times won’t even admit the existence of the hypersonic orbital glider that has been widely reported across the West:

The Financial Times (FT) quoted on Saturday several sources saying that “the Chinese military launched a rocket that carried a hypersonic glide vehicle” in August and judged it to be a “nuclear-capable hypersonic missile.” According to the FT article, the missile “flew through low-orbit space” and could help China “negate” US missile defense systems which are designed to target the fixed parabolic trajectory of a ballistic missile. The progress of the Chinese military has “caught US intelligence by surprise,” the report said.

The US generally has the ability to monitor global missile launches. If the FT report is to be believed, it means that there is a key new member in China’s nuclear deterrence system, which is a new blow to the US’ mentality of strategic superiority over China. According to the FT, the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology announced the 77th and 79th launches of the Long March 2C rocket, but there was no announcement of a 78th launch. The report believes the 78th “secret launch” may be to test the above-mentioned hypersonic missile.

The FT also reported that China has tested a new space capability with a hypersonic missile, citing sources. It said the missile missed its target by about more than 30 kilometers, yet the test showed that “China had made astounding progress on hypersonic weapons.” But if Chinese authorities do not voluntarily release such top defense secrets, others can only speculate based on technical monitoring methods.

It is meaningless to discuss the credibility of the FT report. But it is important to note the unstoppable trend that China is narrowing the gap with the US in some key military technologies as China is continuously developing its economic and technological strength. China doesn’t need to engage in an “arms race” with the US – it is capable of weakening the US’ overall advantages over China by developing military power at its own pace.

China appears to be attempting to reassure the world that despite its weapons development program, its ambitions are toward regional, rather than global, dominance. I tend to believe them, simply because for over two thousand years, they have been considerably more sinned against than sinning with regards to foreign intervention. According to Lee Kuan Yew, even their invasion of Vietnam was limited to containing “the Prussians of Southeast Asia” and dissuading the Vietnamese from expanding their field of operations beyond their occupation of Cambodia.

Of course, that’s the problem with imperialism. In order to be left alone, a nation has to develop sufficient strength to impose its will upon its neighbors. The question, then, is if that nation can simultaneously develop sufficient moral strength to resist the imperialist temptation.

One has to admire the dry restraint of the Chinese foreign ministry. It’s all about space tourism, you see.

Speaking during a regular press briefing on Monday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian was asked to comment on a report from the Financial Times that Beijing had conducted a hypersonic missile test in August, which had shocked US intelligence. The spokesman stated that China had undertaken “routine spacecraft test” to evaluate the rocket’s reusable technology. “This is of great significance for reducing the cost of the spacecraft. The peaceful use of space provides a convenient and inexpensive way to travel,” Zhao added.

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The Éminence Grise

If you ever wondered why my views have tended to sound so harmonious with Chinese policy in recent years, it’s because the leading Chinese intellectual has been looking at the same things I’ve been looking at, reading the same books I’ve been reading, observing the same things I’ve been observing, and reaching strikingly similar conclusions… only he did it 13 years before I did. Of course, it’s extremely informative to observe the difference between the way Wang Huning was embraced by the Chinese elite and the way I was systematically banished and minimized by the Western elite.

At this point, like many during those heady years of reform and opening, Wang remained hopeful that liberalism could play a positive role in China, writing that his recommendations could allow “the components of the modern structure that embody the spirit of modern democracy and humanism [to] find the support they need to take root and grow.”

That would soon change.

Also in 1988, Wang—having risen with unprecedented speed to become Fudan’s youngest full professor at age 30—won a coveted scholarship (facilitated by the American Political Science Association) to spend six months in the United States as a visiting scholar. Profoundly curious about America, Wang took full advantage, wandering about the country like a sort of latter-day Chinese Alexis de Tocqueville, visiting more than 30 cities and nearly 20 universities.

What he found deeply disturbed him, permanently shifting his view of the West and the consequences of its ideas.

Wang recorded his observations in a memoir that would become his most famous work: the 1991 book America Against America. In it, he marvels at homeless encampments in the streets of Washington DC, out-of-control drug crime in poor black neighborhoods in New York and San Francisco, and corporations that seemed to have fused themselves to and taken over responsibilities of government. Eventually, he concludes that America faces an “unstoppable undercurrent of crisis” produced by its societal contradictions, including between rich and poor, white and black, democratic and oligarchic power, egalitarianism and class privilege, individual rights and collective responsibilities, cultural traditions and the solvent of liquid modernity.

But while Americans can, he says, perceive that they are faced with “intricate social and cultural problems,” they “tend to think of them as scientific and technological problems” to be solved separately. This gets them nowhere, he argues, because their problems are in fact all inextricably interlinked and have the same root cause: a radical, nihilistic individualism at the heart of modern American liberalism.

“The real cell of society in the United States is the individual,” he finds. This is so because the cell most foundational (per Aristotle) to society, “the family, has disintegrated.” Meanwhile, in the American system, “everything has a dual nature, and the glamour of high commodification abounds. Human flesh, sex, knowledge, politics, power, and law can all become the target of commodification.” This “commodification, in many ways, corrupts society and leads to a number of serious social problems.” In the end, “the American economic system has created human loneliness” as its foremost product, along with spectacular inequality. As a result, “nihilism has become the American way, which is a fatal shock to cultural development and the American spirit.”

Moreover, he says that the “American spirit is facing serious challenges” from new ideational competitors. Reflecting on the universities he visited and quoting approvingly from Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind, he notes a growing tension between Enlightenment liberal rationalism and a “younger generation [that] is ignorant of traditional Western values” and actively rejects its cultural inheritance. “If the value system collapses,” he wonders, “how can the social system be sustained?”

Ultimately, he argues, when faced with critical social issues like drug addiction, America’s atomized, deracinated, and dispirited society has found itself with “an insurmountable problem” because it no longer has any coherent conceptual grounds from which to mount any resistance.

Once idealistic about America, at the start of 1989 the young Wang returned to China and, promoted to Dean of Fudan’s International Politics Department, became a leading opponent of liberalization.

He began to argue that China had to resist global liberal influence and become a culturally unified and self-confident nation governed by a strong, centralized party-state. He would develop these ideas into what has become known as China’s “Neo-Authoritarian” movement—though Wang never used the term, identifying himself with China’s “Neo-Conservatives.” This reflected his desire to blend Marxist socialism with traditional Chinese Confucian values and Legalist political thought, maximalist Western ideas of state sovereignty and power, and nationalism in order to synthesize a new basis for long-term stability and growth immune to Western liberalism.

Of course, what works for China will not work for the West. Among other things, a Western nation cannot turn to Confucian values it never had. As Lee Kuan Yew reminds us in his memoirs, different peoples must construct their own forms of government that are suited to their customs and culture. But even though Wang’s precise prescription is not an option for us, that does not mean that his diagnosis of the West’s problem being the neo-liberal world order and its rejection of traditional Christian values should be ignored.

Nor does that mean that a Western form of Neo-Authoritarianism designed to restore Western values and Western nationalisms should not be pursued with the same vigor that China has constructed its post-Maoist system, and with a similar confidence of success. The more important question for Americans is: precisely what should American Neo-Authoritarianism look like?

DISCUSS ON SG

Why the US Will Not Defend Taiwan

The question of a US military reaction in the event the Chinese government decides to make use of its military strength to reunify the island with the mainland has been the subject of intense policy debate for years. The US government has encouraged this debate, as its policy of “strategic ambivalence” was specifically formulated in order to prevent the need to make any promises that might need to be broken as well as to add an element of uncertainty to the Chinese leadership’s analysis of the situation.

However, it is abundantly clear that for all its posturing and strong words and saber-rattling, there is no chance that the US military will make any serious attempt to defend the independence of Taiwan island or to intervene in Chinese domestic affairs. There are seven reasons for this.

1. The USA will not risk the conclusive loss of its global status in a single throw.

Since 1989, the US has enjoyed its status as the singular global superpower. But in the aftermath of the astonishingly rapid defeat of Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi military, potential US opponents such as Iran, Russia, and China have intelligently pursued asymmetrical weapons development programs that now permit them to neutralize important aspects of the US military’s advantage. For example, the development of long-range, high-speed anti-ship missiles have eliminated the ability of US carrier groups to enter littoral zones or narrow sea lanes such as the Persian Gulf or the Taiwan Straits without risk.

Since the aircraft carrier replaced the battleship as the chief military symbol of a nation’s power in 1942, the US Navy carrier groups have been the material demonstration of US military dominance to the world. And while refusing to put her carriers at risk to defend Taiwan island would have a negative effect on the global perception of US power, the damage that restraint would do to perceived US status is infinitely less than permitting the world to see one or more USN carriers sent to the bottom of the South China Sea.

2. The American people will not support a war against China.

The American people are tired of the endless wars waged by their government over the last three decades. Despite the best efforts of the warmongering neocons, Americans flatly refused to support calls for invasions of Iran and Syria, and they have welcomed the long-overdue end of the war in Afghanistan. They now eagerly anticipate a final end to the war in Iraq. Unless the People’s Liberation Army were to invade the USA itself, the American people will not support a war against China.

3. The US military is not in any shape to fight a major regional power.

After the ignominious retreat from Afghanistan, the vaccine mandates that threaten to expel 30 percent of its best and most experienced soldiers, the politicization of the ranks above O-6, and the push to include more women, homosexuals, and transvestites, the US military is observably unready for war. At present, it is no more able to dispute the Taiwan Straits with China than it is to contest the Crimea with Russia or even defend its own border with Mexico.

4. Joe Biden is not a credible wartime leader.

Over one-third of Americans believe that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulently stolen from President Donald Trump. This also happens to be the segment of the American population that most strongly supports the U.S. military. And these Americans will not support any military action taken by a man they believe to be an illegitimate and unelected Commander-in-Chief.

5. The USA has nothing to gain and much to potentially lose from a conflict over Taiwan.

What would the American people gain from a successful defense of Taiwan by the U.S. military. Absolutely nothing. At most, the status quo would be maintained, which would provide no actual benefit to any American. But an unsuccessful defense would be severely damaging to world respect for the USA, and a complete military catastrophe would be the first step toward the collapse of the United States as a political entity. To put it in historical terms, any attempt to interfere in the unification of China would run a real risk of becoming the American equivalent of the Athenian Sicilian Expedition.

6. The US government cannot afford a war against its second-largest creditor.

Between the massive public and private debt, the economic lockdowns, the growing number of workers killed and incapacitated by the vaccines, and the huge number of workers being disemployed by the vaccine mandates, the US economy is a shambles. The US government already owes China more than $1 trillion. China obviously will not finance a US war against China, but neither will the US’s leading creditor, Japan.

7. Xi Jinping knows Taiwan.

President Xi knows both Taiwan and the Taiwan people very well. He served as provincial governor for Fujian and Zhejiang, and his success in attracting Taiwan investment into both coastal provinces is considered one of his significant accomplishments. Xi’s objective is unification, by any means necessary, but it is clear that he would prefer the unification to be a peaceful one. And as a leader who has successfully convinced Taiwan capital to join with the mainland in the past, he is very well-positioned to convince the Taiwan people it is in their long-term interest to unify with the mainland rather than resist it.

Ironically, it is the change in the balance of military power in China’s favor that makes a future war in the Taiwan Straits less likely. There are many factors that the Chinese leadership must take into account concerning the ultimate resolution of the unification of Taiwan with the mainland. But a military response by the United States to Chinese action is not one of them.

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