Politics

Revanchist China

Feb 25, 2013 John Lee

For today's China, imbued with a sense of superior moral worth, historical achievement, and victimization by foreigners, the current regional order is unjust and unnatural. So pulling back from any territorial dispute with smaller and inferior states would be a humiliating defeat, not a step toward ensuring long-term regional stability.

SYDNEY – In a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC, on February 22, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe informed the audience of officials, experts, and journalists that Japan is “back” and will not stand down in its ongoing sovereignty dispute with China over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. With Chinese provocations on the rise, US President Barack Obama, Abe’s host, appealed for calm and restraint on both sides.

Japan is likely to accede – grudgingly – to America’s request, as it remains dependent on its alliance with the US for its security. But it will be much more difficult to persuade China that it should stand down.

China’s assertiveness over its sovereignty claim reflects more than a desire to exploit seabed resources, or to gain a widened strategic gateway into the western Pacific. It is also about national renewal and rejuvenation – the core of the Chinese Communist Party’s raison d’être. Turning away from a fight with its former occupier and historical rival would be a step backward in this six-decade-long quest.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 6 Comments on this article

Shiang Peow Foo Mar 7, 2013

Nothing new being discussed in the article. Chinese makes up around 25% of world population but China has less than 10% of world's natural resources. It is either "renewal" or regression.
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Yoshimichi Moriyama Mar 2, 2013

The Chinese are "a people imbued with a deep sense of superior moral worth." Prof. Edwin O. Reischauer said, "The ethnic pride of the Chinese is monumental."

I think Dr. Lee is one of the best China watchers. He reads the inside and outside of China like the palm of his hand. His essays are available at the Centre for Independent Studies (http://www.cis.org.au/) and the Hudson Institute (http://www.hudson.org/). His book "Will China Fall?" is now available online at the former organization.
- Philippe MARICAILLE Aug 7, 2021
  
  I disagree that a Japanologist that worked for the US army intelligence service -- born in 1910, died in 1990 -- that has never learnt Chinese or lived their, would have anything relevant/helpful regarding our current days understanding of China...
  On top of that, here is Wikipedia copy-and-pasted:
  "According to late 20th-century Japanese historian Takashi Fujitani, the memo revealed a "condescension toward Japanese people" and a "purely instrumentalist and manipulative stance." In the abstract to his article, "The Reischauer Memo: Mr. Moto, Hirohito, and Japanese American Soldiers," Fujitani wrote:
  Already at this early date in the war, Reischauer proposed retention of the Japanese emperor as head of a postwar “puppet regime” that would serve U.S. interests in East Asia. He also argued that Japanese Americans had until then been a “sheer liability” and that the United States could turn them into an “asset” by enlisting them in the U.S. military. He reasoned that Japanese American soldiers would be useful for propaganda purposes – that is, to demonstrate to the world and particularly the “yellow and brown peoples” that the United States was not a racist nation."
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Peter Anderson Mar 1, 2013

John,
Do you think that overseas chinese in the West support Chinese communist expansionism, or will they back their new homelands if China continues as you say? I've read in many places of an almost magical hold that Chinese empires have over their expats (underpinned by the real ability to 'stand over' extended family who have remained in China of course). If your article is correct, how comfortable are the overseas Chinese with knowledge that their racial and linguistic homeland is planning to subjugate anyone who doesn't live in Beijing and speak perfectly inflected mandarin out of a face with chinese features? I would have thought that quite embarrassing for them.
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Meng Wu Feb 28, 2013

interesting you arguing that way, which sounds rather provocative than peaceful to me.
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Shane Beck Feb 25, 2013

I guess hacking the NY Times because they dared publish a story on the wealth of China's elite, not to mention countless cases of technological or intellectual property theft must indicate a people with a deep sense of superior moral worth. And that doesn't even go into their human rights abuses......
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