Anti-Japanese riots continued in a number of Chinese cities. Despite a meeting of the two countries’ foreign ministers, little sign of abatement. Given that the country where the rioting is happening is a one-party socialist state with nationalist leanings, there’s bound to be official connivance at some level.
Why is selling the PRC weapons a good idea again?
3 Responses
Feed: A Fistful of Euros
April 18th, 2005 at 11:29 pm
It’s a pretty worrying development. The Chinese government is already heading toward a fascist system of government, and nationalist hysteria will only make it worse.
A Fascist, territorially aggressive China is a very worrying prospect, especially since it havs land disputes with essentially all its neighbors and no compunctions about oppressing non-Han peoples who happen by the vagaries of history to fall under its fist.
We could end up seeing a lot worse than the previous border warfare with India, Vietnam, and the ex-Soviet Union.
April 19th, 2005 at 5:03 pm
……….Given that the country where the rioting is happening is a one-party socialist state with nationalist leanings, there?s bound to be official connivance at some level……….
This was my immediate reaction as well. It was not a warm and fuzzy feeling in my stomach when I saw it either.
I second Hector. China is fast turning not into a free country, but rather a mercantilist, nationalist country with a strong central control. Commonly known as Fascist.
April 22nd, 2005 at 3:50 pm
So, Tokyo has just issued an apology for Japan’s past transgressions and it is 1 - 0 to Beijing in the brownie point stakes. Much more importantly, Tokyo loses a lot of the potency of the “human rights” trump suite during the next round of summit Bridge. Which, I suspect, was the original purpose.
However, before simply writing all this off as one small step on the Chinese road to fascism, perhaps somebody can give me an example of a country which has not misused the populist-nationalist card in this way. Tokyo used it with America when the last round of base talks were underway. Chirac is currently using it: “a vote for the EU constitution is a vote against Bush’s poodle.” And, much to my disgust, Downing Street used it in its “Kill an Argie, Win a Metro” tabloid hysteria-generation campaign during the Falklands war.