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This is so profoundly true and everyone needs to understand that. This is a 2011 video of James Peck, Professor of History at NYU, author of "Ideal Illusions, How the U.S. Government Co-opted Human Rights" and one of the keenest observers of China in the U.S. He explains that... show more
212,938 views • 3 years ago •via X (Twitter)
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He also had a fantastic response to a halfwit question about human rights in China: "you are speaking in a country [the US] that has the largest prison population in the planet, bigger than China's [...] You sometimes say 'we should follow the American model'. What's the American model? Well, find a continent that only has Indians on it that you can get rid of, develop it, become incredibly wealthy, not have foreign powers on your borders and... have the American model!"
Lastly, and I couldn't agree with this more, he explains it is a "profound misunderstanding" to believe China's market reforms "were possible without the revolution" (i.e. the Mao era). He also explains that the Western version of recent Chinese totally miss the context in 1949 when "the US [was] on Taiwan, blockading all the major cities on China that were the treaty ports and you have a 100 million people in those ports whose trade had once been with the external world and no longer can China develop in that road. It's gonna have to figure out how to develop, because of that hostility, I think significantly, a kind of revolution that turns deeply inward."
This is the video this all came from, which is an absolutely fascinating watch!
In Canada, a simple phone call from an MP (who is Chinese but also has a large Chinese constituency) to the Chinese embassy caused a national uproar as "interference in Canadian politics". To note: we know of that phone call because the embassy phones were bugged...
Perfect example
I know a student who was selected by the US embassy in india to be trained in "leadership " course in the USA .. sort of 20-30 days bootcamp. Apparently many Indians were selected. In retrospect, it was just planting their agents in the country, and perhaps illegal too.
Yes, the US do that systematically. They have vast programs to identify the next generation of elites in a country and bring them to the US for "training".
Arnaud, what you describe is not just hypothetical but it is actually happening. I don't even think that Americans who are somehow prominent anti-US government people (think Jan 6) are hanging out at the Russian or Chinese embassy soirées. They might be sympathetic to Russia and China government attitudes, but I would very much doubt they hang out at their respective embassy soirées. Yet we have full on Yellow Peril Chinese scientists and Russian everybody being followed and accused of all kinds of things (few if any getting convicted) in the US and increasingly Europe. So that is not a hypothetical, it is actually happening. But you know what makes it worse? When you actually make the argument that Russia and China are maybe just behaving like the US would behave if it was in the same situation, instead of getting the "hm, I didn't think of that, maybe you are right" you get the "but they don't have a right to behave that way. Because we are right and they are wrong. Because we are a democracy and they aren't. Because we are good and they are evil. So it is normal for us to behave that way, but they don't have a right to behave that way. We can do that to them, but they can't do that to us." Therein lies the problem.
I agree that there is some of that in the US today but it's based on pretty much non-existent interference. And my point is basically: look what's already happening with the *illusion there might be interference* and picture how much more insanely authoritarian the US would become if there was hardcore actual interference at the level of which they do it to China or Russia.
Ghosts in the Machine [produced by 4th PsyOp Group- ARMY Special Operations] points out Tienenman Square [along with Maidan, Perestroika, BLM riots and others] were C_A backed color revolutions. The short also says that era is over.
![EVERYONE interested in the economic relationship between the U.S. and China should watch this, as it is sure to challenge many beliefs you may have. This is William C. Kirby, easily one of the most knowledgeable Western experts on the topic. He is Professor of China Studies at Harvard University and Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He serves as Chairman of the Harvard China Fund, and Faculty Chair of the Harvard Center Shanghai. In other words, when it comes to business and China, there are pretty much no academic figures in the West more qualified than he is. Here the gist of what he says: On each country's openness to business, he says that "actually China is more open to foreign investment than maybe it's ever been under the People's Republic and the United States has become remarkably less open. [...] Right now if you're looking at regulatory risks as an American multinational or a Chinese multinational, thinking to do business in both markets, your biggest risk comes from Washington. Because you don't know when the next set of regulations or public hearings are going to come down. China has become bizarrely but significantly more predictable in this regard than the United States." He gives a few examples of companies he's been working on. The first one being TikTok, with this comment: "It is absolutely a low point in the history of diplomacy and of international relations that the two greatest powers of the world are at odds over a teenage video app." Another example he gives is CATL (the EV battery maker): "The Ford Motor Company, which has been around a long time by adapting to times, wanted to partner with [CATL] so that Ford could have competitive EVs in this country. And yet that becomes politically impossible, so their sustainability goals are certain to be set back and so are those of the United States." Or again, "right here in Cambridge, MA, [for our subway system] the cars are made in Springfield, MA by CRRC [a Chinese company]. [CRRC's] is the biggest industrial investment in Springfield in a half century, overseen and brought to fruition by Republican governor Charlie Baker. And yet Senator Schumer says on the Senate floor that we should not have Chinese cars on the red line because there might be spyware, and people could find out what you're reading, if you're reading..." Last example he gives, that of "a 4th generation textile company that dates back to the 1910s in Shanghai called Esquel, they make half of the high-end men's woven shirts in the world, their largest market being in North America and Europe. A leader in sustainability in the otherwise highly polluted textile industry. They've been caught in the political crossfire because they rely on Xinjiang cotton and they were accused in a very sloppily written report by a graduate student at the Center for Strategic and International Studies [CSIS] of using forced labor in their Xinjiang spinning mill. A mill that I have actually visited and it is entirely automated. So they've lost their North American market and 30,000 employees, and the Xinjiang cotton farmers, the private farmers from whom they bought their cotton in recent years, have less of a market for their cotton." There you go. China is systematically presented as becoming "more repressive", less friendly to business, etc. but those who actually know the topic in considerable depth - like Kirby - know full well that the bulk of the instability and risks associated with doing business in or with China actually comes from Washington. Sequel's Xinjiang story is particularly interesting because it illustrates how Washington uses "human rights" claims to decouple from China, even when it has no basis in reality and results in the impoverishment of Uyghurs farmers in Xinjiang, denying them a substantial share of their income.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1759073971872625094/ext_tw_video_thumb/1759046373037727744/pu/img/4RBhAFFgb1pjAi8m.jpg)
![If you want to understand Asian geopolitics today, this is an absolute must-watch. This is George Yeo, who was a Singaporean cabinet minister during 21 years, including Minister for Foreign Affairs during 7 years. In my humble opinion, very few people out there have such a subtle understanding of geopolitics in Asia as he does. Here's a quick summary of what he says: The US has little knowledge of China He says that "the US political system is decentralized and because of the need to win votes, it goes through emotional phases and is entering such a phase now where China is demonized out of mass emotion. There's some manipulation behind the scenes, but it's not based on knowledge." To him, the US "don't understand the nature of China", the fact that China "is constantly building walls around itself because it is happy in its own homogeneity". He says it is wrong for the US to believe that "China wants to displace them as the top dog in the world" and "trying to contain China, even pull it down" as a result. Not only is this a wrong understanding of China's objectives but the US "may exhaust itself in the process and I don't think it will succeed". He says that with its tariffs and sanctions the US risks making the same mistake as China's Qing dynasty and "become very weak". He believes the primacy of the US dollar will break, and that US actions are "bringing forward that day" He says that "the key event will be when the primacy of the US dollar breaks. We all know it's going to break sometime or other because it's abnormal. If it is 30 years from now, well, let's drink and be merry. But if it's five years, well, we've got to calculate, right? Do we know when the cookie will crumble? We don't know. But the way the US is moving is bringing forward that day." It's "bringing forward that day" because "they try to control countries by sanctions" and as a result more and more countries put counter-measures in place, putting themselves out of the grasp of the US. China is not in trouble and "overcapacity" is "information warfare" He says "there's information warfare against China" and that he "doesn't think" China is in trouble. "Look at the factories, look at the EVs, look at how terrified the Europeans are, accusing China of having overcapacity. I mean, how can you blame China for overcapacity when you have, when you're taking liberties with yourself, having long summers and working short hours and you say no, no, no, no, no, you are working too hard! There are consequences. If families take liberties with their children, with themselves, there's consequences." He believes that Asian societies' "wholesomeness" is an advantage versus the West "Look at Asia, look at China, look at Southeast Asia, look at India. There are people who are hardworking, who are obsessed over their children, who want to have of them a higher education, in order that the kids will have a better education, better health, a better life. [...] They'll do well and we're lucky to be in the part of the world where strange values have not taken over societies. [...] Why is America such a big market for drugs today? And I was watching the Eurovision contest... [...] Parts of it, almost satanic. But it's now part of the fashion in most of Europe. What is happening? PM Lee talked about how we should keep all these woke things away from us as much as possible. I fully agree with him. Keep our societies wholesome. Keep our families intact. I mean, AI is very important, but AI cannot answer moral questions for us. In the end, it is every individual, every child who must make the choice. Be immersed in technology. Make use of it. But have our own sense of what it means to be a human being. So if we use that as a template to judge human society, I say we are very lucky to be in a part of the world where society is by and large wholesome and will do well." It's critical for ASEAN to stick together and not be balkanized, which is what the US is trying to do with the Philippines "If we [ASEAN] don't stick together, we'll be balkanized and instead of becoming neighbours, become clients of big powers. Instead of using them, they make use of us. There's always a threat. Look at the Philippines now. The Philippines have legitimate disputes with China. Both sides have their cases. The Americans see an opportunity there. And jump in, and bring in the Japanese. And now Philippine politics is caught up in this [...] [China and the Philippines] had an agreement, a gentleman's agreement with Duterte, which Marcos has repudiated. So OK, so they must find a new way to equilibrium. And make use of the Americans and not be made use of by the Americans. But it's very difficult when you try to make use of a big power, you end up being made use of by them." Most countries in ASEAN do not want China to be an enemy For instance he says "Vietnam has made a very important decision to go with China": "it was not well reported, but Vietnam has agreed that Hanoi will be linked to Kunming and Nanning by high-speed rail. This is big because each connection is tens of billions of dollars. And will change the topological configuration of logistics and supply chain and human movement for decades to come." Same with Indonesia, noting that "Prabowo's first visit [was] to China" and that when he met Xi Jinping "it was Xiao Di talking to Da Ge. A little brother talking to big brother. But when we went to Japan, then it's brother talking to brother." He adds: "Look at the other countries, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Brunei. No one wants China to be an enemy. And the Americans don't understand this, yet. That because China is getting bigger and bigger for us, all of us want the Americans to be in the room. But if the Americans say no, you have to choose between China and us, then they say no, we can't. How can we choose? I mean, China is where our bread is buttered, you know."](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1795332397304807646/amplify_video_thumb/1795297208633556993/img/XccnrLiJjJNMcD7S.jpg)
![Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: "To me, it's [JFK's] most important speech. It's one of the most important speeches in American history; the thing that he did that was so unusual in that speech is he talked to the American people and asked them to put themselves in the shoes of the Russians..." "The zeitgeist of our era was that America had won the war and now we were going to rightfully dominate the peace. And he said something very, very different to Americans that challenged that patriotic assumption: He said, no, it was actually the Russians who won the war. They weakened Hitler and made it possible for us to march into Berlin." "And he talked about the suffering of the Russians during the war and to legitimize their security concerns, which nobody was doing... what he was saying to the Americans is, no, they have legitimate security concerns the same as we do, and we need to understand those things." "And he reminded Americans of the suffering that the Russians had endured, unimaginable suffering. One in seven Russians had been killed during World War II. He asked Americans to imagine that all of the land, all of the cities, all of the towns from the East Coast to Chicago had been leveled to rubble, that the forests and fields had been burned. And he said that's what happened to Russia during the war. That's what they sacrificed for us, and they have legitimate security concerns to make sure that never happens again..." "I'm speaking you today because the world is once again at a very similar crossroads. As in my uncle's time, nuclear tensions are at an extreme and dangerous level. As in his time, we have a unique opportunity not only to diffuse those tensions, but to take a radically different path, a path towards peace."](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1671354212943290369/ext_tw_video_thumb/1671354006747185153/pu/img/7cVcf85QHLQBMz1l.jpg)
![This is another excerpt from the interview that's worth a watch. The condescension from the journalist is off the chart, he's absolutely convinced of the supremacy of the Western system and he cannot fathom how the DRC president doesn't see it. Like in this exchange: - "The fact that [you partner with Russia and China] at the expense of democracies doesn't bother you? That these are authoritarian regimes? - "What is democracy?" - "There's a difference when you live in a democracy or in a dictatorship, I assure you there is a big difference." - "What is democracy? I went to China in May last year and I met Chinese people who I spoke to privately who told me they were happy to live in their country and in the system they are in. Who am I to judge this system and say it is not democratic?" - "You know very well these unfortunate folks are deported, arrested, tortured" The view of China and the Global South in general in France is truly batshit insane...](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1787045393987235999/ext_tw_video_thumb/1787042869863485440/pu/img/Tq1JYVwAHQXta6GY.jpg)
