Early last month, the UN Security Council voted to toughen its sanctions on North Korea. Due to worries that China would be threatened if the US deploys the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system in South Korea or even “decapitates” North Korea, Beijing this time decided to support the sanctions.
The move angered Pyongyang so much that the government-controlled media condemned not only “American imperialism,” but also a “major power” that is so concerned with saving face and status that it will not even stop at severing a “friendship sealed in blood” as it tried to secretly reach an agreement that suppresses “justice and truth.”
It is obvious that the major power is China. Indeed, the “friendship sealed in blood” between the two “brotherly states” and “brotherly parties” has lasted for more than 60 years, so North Korea should have a clear understanding of what lengths and levels of secrecy China is willing to go to due to considerations of face and status.
Beijing’s threats to president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) are a case in point. Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) warning to Tsai that “the earth would move and mountains would shake” if she does not accept the so-called “1992 consensus” has been followed by a long series of rumors from all quarters. Some repeated rumors include China cutting the number of tourists to Taiwan and poaching the nation’s diplomatic allies.
China’s sneakiness depends on whether it is afraid of doing what it wants to do. It will never abandon North Korea, a close old buddy that shares a similar ideology. Still, worrying that the US might handle the issue by force, it had no choice but to reluctantly support the UN sanctions.
However, Beijing is merely putting on a show and it is unwilling to impose true sanctions. Otherwise, Pyongyang would be unable to survive and it would never dare to issue nuclear threats.
China’s attempts to force Tsai to accept the “1992 consensus” also come out of a concern with face and status. However, it does not dare to impose sanctions on Taiwan, and that is why Beijing keeps issuing threats and playing sneaky little tricks. It is well aware that it might not be easy to avoid embarrassment if any big move has the opposite of its intended outcome.
Several years ago, it punished Kaohsiung by banning Chinese tourists from visiting and since then, the city has leaned even heavier toward the pan-green camp.
If it greatly angers Taiwanese, Taiwan would only move further away from China. Does China dare resolve this by force, in complete disregard of what the US and Japan think?
China would of course hurt Taiwan if it were to make a big move, but it would not be the end of the world. After some short-term pain, Taiwan would recover and would finally be able to rid itself of the Republic of China burden. Meanwhile, the internal power struggles of the Chinese Communist Party would continue to grow and it would eventually break apart.
Shamelessly, some Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) politicians and commentators are unwilling to stand together with Taiwanese and safeguard Taiwanese sovereignty. Instead, they are attempting to legitimize China’s sneaky tricks. By doing so, they are helping Beijing do evil.
Taiwanese should see through China’s sneaky tricks, which are a reflection of its lack of confidence, and they should build a new nation of their own, confidently and strategically. If they are so frightened that they are willing to abandon their principles, the Chinese nightmare would never end and they would always fear abduction by the Chinese communists regardless of where they go in the world.
Paul Lin is a political commentator.
Translated by Eddy Chang
On May 7, 1971, Henry Kissinger planned his first, ultra-secret mission to China and pondered whether it would be better to meet his Chinese interlocutors “in Pakistan where the Pakistanis would tape the meeting — or in China where the Chinese would do the taping.” After a flicker of thought, he decided to have the Chinese do all the tape recording, translating and transcribing. Fortuitously, historians have several thousand pages of verbatim texts of Dr. Kissinger’s negotiations with his Chinese counterparts. Paradoxically, behind the scenes, Chinese stenographers prepared verbatim English language typescripts faster than they could translate and type them
More than 30 years ago when I immigrated to the US, applied for citizenship and took the 100-question civics test, the one part of the naturalization process that left the deepest impression on me was one question on the N-400 form, which asked: “Have you ever been a member of, involved in or in any way associated with any communist or totalitarian party anywhere in the world?” Answering “yes” could lead to the rejection of your application. Some people might try their luck and lie, but if exposed, the consequences could be much worse — a person could be fined,
Xiaomi Corp founder Lei Jun (雷軍) on May 22 made a high-profile announcement, giving online viewers a sneak peek at the company’s first 3-nanometer mobile processor — the Xring O1 chip — and saying it is a breakthrough in China’s chip design history. Although Xiaomi might be capable of designing chips, it lacks the ability to manufacture them. No matter how beautifully planned the blueprints are, if they cannot be mass-produced, they are nothing more than drawings on paper. The truth is that China’s chipmaking efforts are still heavily reliant on the free world — particularly on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing
Keelung Mayor George Hsieh (謝國樑) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) on Tuesday last week apologized over allegations that the former director of the city’s Civil Affairs Department had illegally accessed citizens’ data to assist the KMT in its campaign to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) councilors. Given the public discontent with opposition lawmakers’ disruptive behavior in the legislature, passage of unconstitutional legislation and slashing of the central government’s budget, civic groups have launched a massive campaign to recall KMT lawmakers. The KMT has tried to fight back by initiating campaigns to recall DPP lawmakers, but the petition documents they