Former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was captured recently without resisting. This surprised Westerners because it did not fit with his reputation for brutality. It shocked Arabs because some of them viewed him as a hero.
Saddam turned out to be a coward, cowering like a rat in a hole, and he gave up as soon as he saw US soldiers.
No dictator is a hero. They manage to appear mighty only because the media in their countries cannot reveal their ugliness. State-owned newspapers and TV stations glorify dictators every day.
This is exactly what is going on in today's China. According to the media reports that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controls, all those in power are heroes and wise leaders.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's (
But in reality, all Wen does is repeat empty words formulated by the CCP, without sincerity or truthfulness.
Wen told at least three lies while he was in the US.
First, at a banquet held by the National Committee on US-China Relations on the day he met US President George W. Bush, Wen said that he "had to face the bayonets of fascist aggressors" when he was a child.
Wen is 61, which means that he was born in 1942. He was only three years old when Japan surrendered in 1945. How can he remember what happened when he was three? Isn't it more than clear that what he said is an implausible lie?
How could it be possible that his mother held her three-year-old child up to Japanese bayonets? Is this logical?
Now to the second lie. Wen probably did some homework before he flew to the US and found out that Americans often say, "When I was a kid, my mom said..." or "When I was young, my father taught me to..."
Therefore, Wen mentioned his family background in the opening remarks of a speech he delivered in the US.
He said that "I am a very ordinary person ... When I was very young, my mother told me that I should treat people with truthfulness, sincerity, cordiality and devotion (
Some have commented that such sensational remarks are rare among China's high-ranking officials. But if Wen were sincere in making his remarks, it would not matter how sensational they were.
But did Wen's mother really say "truthfulness, sincerity, cordiality and devotion?" When talking to their children, mothers tend to use words that are simple, colloquial and easy to remember, not formal and hard-to-pronounce words. The words that Wen used are nothing like the words that mothers say to their children.
More importantly, Wen was only seven when the CCP gained control of the government in 1949. Ever since elementary school, he has lived under communist rule. At that time, children in China were taught what the "party mother" said and what then party chairman Mao Zedong (
Did Wen ever have an adolescence during which he could speak sincere words or when he was taught to tell the truth? Did he or his mother dare do that?
Since he was a child, Wen has lived in a society in which only liars can survive. If he had dared tell the truth over the course of his life, could he have become China's premier?
Because he has climbed so high in a society full of lies, he has lost the ability to tell the difference between truth and lies. It is nonsense for Wen to praise the value of "truthfulness."
Third, when Wen discussed the Taiwan issue, he cited a line by a famous Taiwanese poet. The poet expressed how much he missed Taiwan and cared about its people by saying that the curved, shallow Taiwan Strait is a site of nostalgia.
While the two lies mentioned above only become obvious when looked at with common sense and logic, this third one is immediately transparent. Who would aim 500 missiles at Taiwan and then say "I feel deep nostalgia for you"?
Do Chinese people always convey nostalgia with missiles?
Think about the scenario in which a husband holds five meat cleavers to his wife's neck and gently says how much he misses her. Give me a break! Even a stage play would not contain such a scene.
Russian writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said that communist countries are rife with lies; lies dominate and cover up everything in such countries. Wen's generation grew up in a typical communist system and now he is a core member of a system ruled by lies. It is not surprising that Wen tells lies.
Solzhenitsyn said that only by stopping lying can one free oneself from the shackles of the communist system. But his statement should be reversed -- only by breaking up the communist system can one stop lying.
Cao Chang-ching is a writer and journalist based in New York.
Translated by Jackie Lin
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
RSS