By Pepe Escobar – posted with permission
Chinese President Xi Jinping visits the Jiayu Pass, a famed MIng Dynasty era part of the Great Wall in Jiayuguan City, during an inspection tour of northwest China’s Gansu Province, August 20, 2019. Photo: Facebook
China has learned from its own rich history and is applying those lessons to re-emerge as a major 21st century power
Chinese President Xi Jinping visits the Jiayu Pass, a famed MIng Dynasty era part of the Great Wall in Jiayuguan City, during an inspection tour of northwest China’s Gansu Province, August 20, 2019. Photo: FacebookWith hybrid warfare 2.0 against China reaching fever pitch, the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative, will continue to be demonized 24/7 as the proverbial evil communist plot for economic and geopolitical domination of the “free” world, boosted by a sinister disinformation campaign.
It’s idle to discuss with simpletons. In the interest of an informed debate, what matters is to find the deeper roots of Beijing’s strategy – what the Chinese learned from their own rich history and how they are applying these lessons as a re-emerging major power in the young 21st century.
Let’s start with how East and West used to position themselves at the center of the world.
The first Chinese historic-geographic encyclopedia, the 2nd century B.C. Classic of the Mountains and the Seas, tells us the world was what was under the sun (tienhia). Composed of “mountains and seas” (shanhai), the world was laid out between “four seas” (shihai). There’s only one thing that does not change: the center. And its name is “Middle Kingdom” (Zhongguo), that is, China.
Of course, the Europeans, in the 16th century, discovering that the earth was round, turned Chinese centrality upside down. But actually not that much (see, for instance, this 21st century Sinocentric map published in 2013).
The principle of a huge continent surrounded by seas, the “exterior ocean,” seems to have derived from Buddhist cosmology, in which the world is described as a “four-petal lotus.” But the Sinocentric spirit was powerful enough to discard and prevail over every cosmogony that might have contradicted it, such as the Buddhist, which placed India at the center.
Now compare Ancient Greece. Its center, based on reconstituted maps by Hippocrates and Herodotus, is a composite in the Aegean Sea, featuring the Delphi-Delos-Ionia triad. The major split between East and West goes back to the Roman empire in the 3rd century. And it starts with Diocletian, who made it all about geopolitics.
Here’s the sequence: In 293, he installs a tetrarchy, with two Augustuses and two Caesars, and four prefectures. Maximian Augustus is charged to defend the West (Occidens), with the “prefecture of Italy” having Milan as capital. Diocletian charges himself to defend the East (Oriens), with the “prefecture of Orient” having Nicomedia as capital.
Political religion is added to this new politico-military complex. Diocletian starts the Christian dioceses (dioikesis, in Greek, after his name), twelve in total. There is already a diocese of the Orient – basically the Levant and northern Egypt.
There’s no diocese of the Occident. But there is a diocese of Asia: basically the Western part of Mediterranean Turkey nowadays, heir to the ancient Roman provinces in Asia. That’s quite interesting: the Orient is placed east of Asia.
The historical center, Rome, is just a symbol. There’s no more center; in fact, the center is slouching towards the Orient. Nicomedia, Diocletian’s capital, is quickly replaced by neighbor Byzantium under Constantine and rechristened as Constantinople: he wants to turn it into “the new Rome.”
When the Western Roman empire falls in 476, the empire of the Orient remains.
Officially, it will become the Byzantine empire only in the year 732, while the Holy Roman Empire – which, as we know, was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire – resurrects with Charlemagne in 800. From Charlemagne onwards, the Occident regards itself as “Europe,” and vice-versa: the historical center and the engine of this vast geographical space, which will eventually reach and incorporate the Americas.
Superstar admiral
We’re still immersed in a – literally – oceanic debate among historians about the myriad reasons and the context that led everyone and his neighbor to frenetically take to the seas starting in the late 15th century – from Columbus and Vasco da Gama to Magellan.
But the West usually forgets about the true pioneer: iconic Admiral Zheng He, original name Ma He, a eunuch and Muslim Hui from Yunnan province.
His father and grandfather had been pilgrims to Mecca. Zheng He grew up speaking Mandarin and Arabic and learning a lot about geography. When he was 13, he was placed in the house of a Ming prince, Zhu Di, member of the new dynasty that came to power in 1387.
Educated as a diplomat and warrior, Zheng He converted to Buddhism under his new name, although he always remained faithful to Islam. After all, as I saw for myself when I visited Hui communities in 1997 when branching out from the Silk Road, on my way to Labrang monastery in Xiahe, Hui Islam is a fascinating syncretism incorporating Buddhism, the Tao and Confucianism.
Zhu Di brought down the Emperor in 1402 and took the name Yong Le. A year later he had already commissioned Zheng He as admiral, and ordered him to supervise the construction of a large fleet to explore the seas around China. Or, to be more precise, the “Occidental ocean” (Xiyang): that is, the Indian Ocean.
Thus from 1405 to 1433, roughly three decades, Zheng He led seven expeditions across the seas all the way to Arabia and Eastern Africa, leaving from Nanjing in the Yangtze and benefiting from monsoon winds. They hit Champa, Borneo, Java, Malacca, Sumatra, Ceylon, Calicut, Hormuz, Aden, Jeddah/Mecca, Mogadiscio and the Eastern African coast south of the Equator.
Those were real armadas, sometimes with over 200 ships, including the 72 main ones, carrying as many as 30,000 men and vast amounts of precious merchandise for trade: silk, porcelain, silver, cotton, leather products, iron utensils. The leading vessel of the first expedition, with Zheng He as captain, was 140 meters long, 50 meters wide and carrying over 500 men.
This was the original Maritime Silk Road, now revived in the 21st century. And it was coupled with another extension of the overland Silk Road: after all the dreaded Mongols were in retreat, there were new allies all the way to Transoxiana, the Chinese managed to strike a peace deal with the successor of Tamerlane. So the Silk Roads were booming again. The Ming court sent diplomats all over Asia – Tibet, Nepal, Bengal, even Japan.
The main objective of pioneering Chinese seafaring has always puzzled Western historians. Essentially, it was a diplomatic, commercial and military mix. It was important to have Chinese suzerainty recognized – and materialized via the payment of a tribute. But most of all this was about trade; no wonder the ships had special cabins for merchants.
The armada was designated as the Treasury Fleet – but denoting more a prestige operation than a vehicle for capturing riches. Yong Le was strong on soft power and economics – as he took control of overseas trade by imposing an imperial monopoly over all transactions. So in the end this was a clever, comprehensive application of the Chinese tributary system – in the commercial, diplomatic and cultural spheres.
Yong Le was in fact following the instructions of his predecessor Hongwu, the founder of the Ming (“Lights”) dynasty. Legend rules that Hongwu ordered that one billion trees should be planted in the Nanjing region to supply the building of a navy.
Then there was the transfer of the capital from Nanjing to Beijing in 1421, and the construction of the Forbidden City. That cost a lot of money. As much as the naval expeditions were expensive, their profits, of course, were useful.
Yong Le wanted to establish Chinese – and pan-Asian – stability via a true Pax Sinica. That was not imposed by force but rather by diplomacy, coupled with a subtle demonstration of power. The Armada was the aircraft carrier of the time, with cannons on sight – but rarely used – and practicing “freedom of navigation”.
What the emperor wanted was allied local rulers, and for that he used intrigue and commerce rather than shock and awe via battles and massacres. For instance, Zheng He proclaimed Chinese suzerainty over Sumatra, Cochin and Ceylon. He privileged equitable commerce. So this was never a colonization process.
On the contrary: before each expedition, as its planning proceeded, emissaries from countries to be visited were invited to the Ming court and treated, well, royally.
Plundering Europeans
Now compare that with the European colonization led a decade later by the Portuguese across these same lands and these same seas. Between (a little) carrot and (a lot of) stick, the Europeans drove commerce mostly via massacres and forced conversions. Trading posts were soon turned into forts and military installations, something that Zheng He’s expeditions never attempted.
In fact Zheng He left so many good memories that he was divinized under his Chinese name, San Bao, which means “Three Treasures,” in such places in Southeast Asia as Malacca and Siam’s Ayutthaya.
What can only be described as Judeo-Christian sadomasochism focused on imposing suffering as virtue, the only path to reach Paradise. Zheng He would never have considered that his sailors – and the populations he made contact with – had to pay this price.
So why did it all end, and so suddenly? Essentially Yong Le run out of money because of his grandiose imperial adventures. The Grand Canal – linking the Yellow River and the Yangtze basins – cost a fortune. Same for building the Forbidden City. The revenue from the expeditions was not enough.
And just as the Forbidden City was inaugurated, it caught fire in May 1421. Bad omen. According to tradition, this means disharmony between Heaven and the sovereign, a development outside of the astral norm. Confucians used it to blame the eunuch councilors, very close to the merchants and the cosmopolitan elites around the emperor. On top of it, the southern borders were restless and the Mongol threat never really went away.
The new Ming emperor, Zhu Gaozhi, laid down the law: “China’s territory produces all goods in abundance; so why should we buy abroad trinkets without any interest?”
His successor Zhu Zanji was even more radical. Up to 1452, a series of imperial edicts prohibited foreign trade and overseas travel. Every infraction was considered piracy punished by death. Worse, studying foreign languages was banished, as was the teaching of Chinese to foreigners.
Zheng He died (in early 1433? 1435?) in true character, in the middle of the sea, north of Java, as he was returning from the seventh, and last, expedition. The documents and the charts used for the expeditions were destroyed, as well as the ships.
So the Ming ditched naval power and re-embraced old agrarian Confucianism, which privileges agriculture over trade, the earth over the seas, and the center over foreign lands.
No more naval retreat
The takeaway is that the formidable naval tributary system put in place by Yong Le and Zheng He was a victim of excess – too much state spending, peasant turbulence – as well as its own success.
In less than a century, from the Zheng He expeditions to the Ming retreat, this turned out to be a massive game changer in history and geopolitics, prefiguring what would happen immediately afterwards in the long 16th century: the era when Europe started and eventually managed to rule the world.
One image is stark. While Zheng He’s lieutenants were sailing the eastern coast of Africa all the way to the south, in 1433, the Portuguese expeditions were just starting their adventures in the Atlantic, also sailing south, little by little, along the Western coast of Africa. The mythical Cape Bojador was conquered in 1434.
After the seven Ming expeditions crisscrossed Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean from 1403 for nearly three decades, only half a century later Bartolomeu Dias would conquer the Cape of Good Hope, in 1488, and Vasco da Gama would arrive in Goa in 1498.
Imagine a historical “what if?”: the Chinese and the Portuguese bumping into each other in Swahili land. After all, in 1417 it was the turn of Hong Bao, the Muslim eunuch who was Zheng He’s lieutenant; and in 1498 it was Vasco da Gama’s turn, guided by the “Lion of the Sea” Ibn Majid, his legendary Arab master navigator.
The Ming were not obsessed with gold and spices. For them, trade should be based on equitable exchange, under the framework of the tribute. As Joseph Needham conclusively proved in works such as Science and Civilization in China, the Europeans wanted Asian products way more than Orientals wanted European products, “and the only way to pay for them was gold.”
For the Portuguese, the “discovered” lands were all potential colonization territory. And for that the few colonizers needed slaves. For the Chinese, slavery amounted to domestic chores at best. For the Europeans, it was all about the massive exploitation of a workforce in the fields and in mines, especially concerning black populations in Africa.
In Asia, in contrast to Chinese diplomacy, the Europeans went for massacre. Via torture and mutilations, Vasco da Gama and other Portuguese colonizers deployed a real war of terror against civilian populations.
This absolutely major structural difference is at the root of the world- system and the geo-historical organization of our world, as analyzed by crack geographers such as Christian Grataloup and Paul Pelletier. Asian nations did not have to manage – or to suffer – the painful repercussions of slavery.
So in the space of only a few decades the Chinese abdicated from closer relations with Southeast Asia, India and Eastern Africa. The Ming fleet was destroyed. China abandoned overseas trade and retreated unto itself to focus on agriculture.
Once again: the direct connection between the Chinese naval retreat and the European colonial expansion is capable of explaining the development process of the two “worlds” – the West and the Chinese center – since the 15th century.
At the end of the 15th century, there were no Chinese architects left capable of building large ships. Development of weaponry also had been abandoned. In just a few decades, crucially, the Sinified world lost its vast technological advance over the West. It got weaker. And later it would pay a huge price, symbolized in the Chinese unconsciousness by the “century of humiliation.”
All of the above explains quite a few things. How Xi Jinping and the current leadership did their homework. Why China won’t pull a Ming remix and retreat again. Why and how the overland Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road are being revived. How there won’t be any more humiliations. And most of all, why the West – especially the American empire – absolutely refuses to admit the new course of history.
Charlemagne (Charles the Great) wasn’t Emporer of the Holy Roman Empire. He was Emporer of the Kingdom of the Franks or Carolingian Empire and therefore predecessor of the Holy Roman Empire under Otto the Great which splitt-off from Carolingian Eastern Francia.
One could look at the ‘tribute’ as protection money, as in Mafia shake down, perhaps bend or break a few fingers along the way (basiclly what the US does today). Not sure why the coloniziers from the west didn’t want to go along with that system. Carrot or stick; vassels are vassels, slaves are slaves, as long as you pay up, you are safe. What passes for a destroyed navy (bloated and without enemy) and retreating home to farm, underscores the over-reach of Empire………..one falls, one steps up, history repeats……………….will the BRI change that, I doubt I will live that long to find out.
As we seem to be heading into an anti global, get more local phase of human redevelopment (hopefully), what’s old is new, making apple pie and such………………..will global anti consumerism (we have enough $stores) aid or abet BRI?
”His successor Zhu Zanji was even more radical. Up to 1452, a series of imperial edicts prohibited foreign trade and overseas travel. Every infraction was considered piracy punished by death. Worse, studying foreign languages was banished, as was the teaching of Chinese to foreigners.”
What an imbecile. Worst effing Emperor China has ever had. In hindsight, he stands out as the architect of China’s century of humiliation which was to come four centuries later.
It’s still the same. Real masters in China, aren’t allowed to teach ‘real martial arts’ to the white devils.
I spent my last 30 years living in China, and spent 1,000’s of hours in public buses watching movies of Chinese women being raped by Japanese & American soldiers. Something about 12 hr bus rides, where they love to feed you these 4+ hour movies about WW2. Not mentioned or known in the West, but when I first moved to Shanghai in the 1980’s, the locals were still alive that remembered when the USA ran the city and the brothels & gambling houses (1920’s+). But they loved me cuz the Americans dropped the A-Bomb on Japan.
Then & now there is a need for commerce and trade, why not it makes people rich, and it gets the young and smart out of dodge. But make no mistake the Chinese have nothing but contempt for the white-dog, white-trash, and white-devil.
Never forget that in China, “White” is the color of death.
You made a mistake: you look at China and Chinese in black and white. With 5000 years of civilisation, it is in our DNA not to look at social-political issues in black and white as the only view point. We do look at issues holistically.
This is in line with the Bible where even as God cursed Adam and Eve because of their sin, He inserted a hope: the Seed of the woman will crush the head of the serpent, thereby freeing mankind from the curse and offering the hope of salvation and reconciliation with God.
So the whole world is a bit coloured from my viewpoint. But with the colour of red – Christ’s blood and sacrifice infusing the whole fabric of human history.
Xi won’t make those mistakes.
The leadership in the West is very weak. Xi and Putin will outmaneuver the West easily.
The only thing preventing the emergence of a better world is the prospect of war.
If war doesn’t happen we have to hope that the emerging powers, Russia and China, do not fall victim to the same hubris that destroyed the West.
China has every right to protect and defend itself. It also has every right to choose not to accept any nonsense that it chooses not to accept.
I hope for the best for the Chinese people, and nation.
I believe that China is an absolutely indispensable part of humanity, and that it is very much neccesary accept this fact, and behave accordingly.
May peace be established, and indeed prevail.
Best wishes from this dude.
Mainlanders won’t be learning anything about China’s ‘rich history’ anytime soon, unless diaspora Chinese agree to teach them.
Islam cannot ‘incorporate’ non-theistic religions like Buddhism and Taoism. Anyway, Chinese syncretism does not involve any kind of incorporation.
Hui Islam is distinctively Chinese, but not at the cost of its religious orthodoxy.
As for Westerm ‘torture and mutilations’, I advise a quick look at the Chinese Imperial penal codes.
Confucianism does not prejudice one thing over another as the author suggests. The earth and seas are natural to the world, just as agriculture and trade are natural to society.
Some of “the Chinese penal codes” of previous dynasties were so voluminous as to be nearly unlearneable and unusable. Which I feel may have been their true intent. much of the ‘torture and mutilation’ was more meant to humiliate the offenders than dedicated to inflicting pain. For instance the “Death by a thousand cuts” always included giving the poor victim large doses of opium and strong spirits in advance so as to make him quite unconcious.
“Voluminous” and “unlearnable/unusable” to whom?
You are surely joking? “Mainlanders won’t be learning anything about China’s ‘rich history’ anytime soon, unless diaspora Chinese agree to teach them”?
All the archaeological sites and original documents are in the Mainland. What are you talking about?
Remember Mao wanted to get rid of everything ancient Chinese, because he thought it was holding China back, preventing China from progressing into the modern age. It was the diaspora, especially Taiwan, who preserved the ancient Chinese culture and artifacts. Mao wanted to destroy the Four Olds completely.
“The Four Olds were: Old Customs, Old Culture, Old Habits, and Old Ideas. The campaign to destroy the Four Olds began in Beijing on August 19, 1966, shortly after the launch of the Cultural Revolution. ”
Which is why it is always interesting when PRC people now talk about the 5000 years of Chinese culture / civilization, because they had wanted to destroy all of that.
Unfortunately, the Communists did actually succeed in destroying traditional culture in the People’s Republic. The PRC today is traditionally Chinese in the same way that Disneyland’s Castle is traditionally French.
A living culture is not made of ‘archeologicial sites and original documents’.
Hajduk. I put it to you that you have not lived among the Chinese in China for any length of time longer than 6 months, no?
Hahaha! But Mao said to Nixonthat he did not succeed in destroying the Four Olds. He said that the Chinese are only conforming on the surface. But the moment he goes to meet Marx, they will revert to form.
I have seen this reversion (or revisionism to Mao) with my own eyes.
Those who never brushed their teeth are now the experts on the culture. Fascinating.
gT, You are assuming again. I am Chinese. I am a grandfather. I brushed my teeth my whole life. I still have all my strong 32 teeth and good gums.
The educated among the Chinese knows their personal hygiene.
The author misses several important historic differences between China and Europe.
1. Imperial China was a comparatively large empire defined by hydraulic agriculture (irrigation) which required a high degree of centralization to maintain and defend. Europe, by contrast, consisted of a number of smaller competing polities, all vying for dominance within a relatively small geographic arena, the result being intense competition which drove technical innovations in the science of warfare.
2. Mediterranean Europe had a favorable oceanic environment in which maritime trade and warfare developed from ancient times. Relatively sheltered waters, and the existence of multiple near-at-hand trading partners led to the rapid development of shipbuilding and navigational expertise. China, by contrast, faced a wide open ocean with frequent typhoons and unfavorable onshore winds, plus a greater distance between ports of trade, making maritime expansion less economical.
3. Besides competition for naval supremacy (Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, British) European naval expansion had the advantage of prevailing Atlantic wind patterns that permitted travel in both east and west directions, allowing for the rapid expansion of western colonies, which was relatively unopposed by the primitive societies encountered. In addition, they has a shorter distance to travel than China in reaching the New World.
4. Shipbuilding, much like contemporary space exploration, drove innovations in metallurgy, mathematics, and science in general. Chinese shipbuilding and navigation, by contrast, were centuries behind European developments. European superiority in the casting and forging of metals, the use of gunpowder, the mathematics of ballistics and celestial navigation, and the later development of mechanical clocks, gave Europe a dominant position in maritime trade and conquest.
5. Finally, one of the most significant and overlooked developments in Western Civilization which failed to take root in China was the introduction of the phonetic alphabet, named for the Phoenicians, an early sea trading people who developed a unique system for representing the sounds of the various languages they encountered in their voyages. Adopted by the Greeks and continued by the Romans, the phonetic alphabet made it possible to represent and transmit knowledge at a much faster rate than in China, limited as they were by a quasi-symbolic language which required knowledge of a minimum of 10,000 characters in order to communicate effectively. Apart from Latin, the universal language of European exchange and commerce, the educated classes of Europe spoke at least two other languages, thus exchange of information advanced at a rapid pace compared to China, limited as they were by their cumbersome writing system. In short, the faster you learn to read and write, the sooner you acquire new knowledge, and as we all know, knowledge is power.
There were other factors at play, but these are the ones that seem most relevant to me. Decisions made by ruling elites have always been informed and constrained by the facts on the ground, the basic elements of which are geography, agriculture, competition between polities and the transmission of knowledge via language and print.
@ebear,
I have been studying Chinese weapons and would dispute some of your findings about the ‘dominance” of european weapons. See here: https://www.visiontimes.com/2016/09/06/ancient-chinese-inventions-that-were-truly-ahead-of-their-time.html
The Chinese created the sea mine, the torpedo, rockets, and gun power well before the eurpoeans. Centuries behind? I don’t think so.
I’ll concede the point, but how effective were Chinese armaments against European? That is the true test. The fact remains that in nearly every conflict between China and the European powers, China was defeated, and on their own soil by enemies that had to travel a thousand miles to engage them.
Not a very good record. Ironic actually, when you consider that Sun Tsu’s Art of War is required reading in western military academies;)
So what if the British had naval superiority during their empire.. The Ottomans were also fierce & successful warriors (land force not a naval force). It doesn’t change the fact they were obscurantists who appropriated inventions from other civilizations (Byzantium, Babylonia, Northern Arab) ..The capacity to wage war is just that..and not reflection of the contributions made by that particular society.
The European military battles with China was after Qing China stood down it’s navy and artillery in favour of pacifism for 150 years.
At the time of Admiral’s Zheng He’s fleet, no European warship was able to match it by far. If the Portuguese were to round the cape of Good Hope earlier and fought the Chinese they would have been sunk fast. But I don’t think there would even have been a fight. The Portuguese would have turned tail and fled.
I have seen a life-sized model of the Portuguese man-of-war. The average sized man-of-war in Zheng He’s fleet was dozens of times bigger. It’s cannons then were much more powerful.
Because of the influence of Buddhism, all dynasties after the Tang (618-907 AD) tended towards pacifism. That’s why the Southern Song Dynasty took a defensive position against the Mongols under Kublai Khan, even though Song Dynasty’s weaponry (cannons, rockets, grenades) could have wiped out the Mongols.
Buddhist-based pacifism also contributed to the Ming looking inward after the Emperor Yong Le.
The same pacifism, which by the way went against Sun Tzu’s advice to always be ready to fight a war, also contributed to the Qing dynasty’s standing down its armies and artillery that have leveled the Russians at Albasin (twice) and forced the Russians to sign the Treaty of Nerchinsk (signed under Qing’s artillery) in 1689 (besides also pacifying a vast empire and bringing peace).
China under Deng and under Jiang was also following traditional pacifism until the Taiwan crisis of 1996 and especially the “accidental” bombing of her embassy in Belgrade by the US in 1999. China was literally ‘bombed’ out of its complacency as far as its military prowess was concerned.
As long as there is an aggressive power on the face of the earth, China must never let her guard down again. It’s so easy to be complacent.
My personal favourite is a bamboo oil-rig, or rather a salt extraction derrick with bamboo drill bits in which pockets of gas were siphoned off to power the salt drying pans.
The meritocratic Mandarin system, on the rare ocassions that it worked properly, was certainly the most effective form of administration in the ancient world. However, the military mandarins were never on the same level as their civilian counterparts, which is why China used client armies. So I’m afraid they never really stood a chance against the Mongols.
China’s slow inward-looking decline was due to many factors, but the adoption of pacifistic beliefs certainly wasn’t one of them. Besides Buddhist isn’t really a pacifistic religion. It even supplied the Chinese empire with warrior monk armies on occasion.
As for bamboo, the US learn more about its use in booby traps in the Vietnam war.
China use “client armies”? Hahaha! Like the US trying to use its allies as first cannon fodders? Hahaha!
Neither the Chinese nor the Italians are particularly martial, which is why their empires relied on foreign troops. China never stood a chance against the Mongols.
As for Buddhism, it even supplied the Chinese empire with warrior monk armies on occasion. The idea that Buddhism is pacifistic is really a Western notion. By the time of Kublai Khan most Mongols were Buddhist.
Sorry for my duplicated comment (I thought I had been deleted again).
Scholars are generally opposed to the idea, but it’s not impossible that a faint Middle Eastern memory of the seven voyages of San Bao actually inspired the tale of the seven voyages of Sinbad.
My previous comment must have been disallowed because of my reference to barbarian mindsets and the demise of the USSR. But there are some cogent points in it. So I shall repost without what I think are the offending points.
China is not a martial country? Rely on foreign troops? You must be thinking of the USA whose “Spokes and Hub” strategy designated its allies as front-line cannon fodder.
China fought the 2nd Sino-Japanese war beginning in 1931 on her own, poorly armed and without help until Pearl Harbour in Dec 1941.
China also fought the Korean war in 1950 with her own soldiers, also poorly armed. It was the US which used foreign troops i.e. non-US troops.
But the US was so shocked that they were pushed back and have to settle for a stalemate in the Korean war that throughout the Vietnam war later, they dared not invade North Vietnam. And their operations in South Vietnam and Cambodia were also bogged down by China’s material and logistical support to the Vietnamese and the Cambodians, with the fear of direct Chinese intervention hanging over the US all the time.
So where did you learn that China rely on foreign troops?
And it was from China that the world got Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” – a must read for every general.
And Sun Tzu struck a balance between war and livelihood. It was the barbarians, both ancient and modern which made military plunder as their main economy.
But none of those military states survived today. E.g. the Mongols, Prussia, etc. And the US military state is heading the same way into the dustbin of history
‘…They dared not invade North Vietnam’ applies to both the US and China.
Imperial China recruited neighbouring nomads into its armies for many centuries in order to defend its borders (against other nomads). As with the Roman foederati this policy sometimes had unfortunate results, for example at the Battle of Talas (751 CE) two thirds of the Chinese army was composed of Qarluq Turkmen mercenaries, who switched sides during the battle leading to Imperial China’s crushing defeat (at the hands of a coalition of Arabs and Tibetans).
China dared not invade North Vietnam? Hahaha! you lack history knowledge. Can anyone enlighten this Hajduk as to what happened in 1979?
Hajduk. Battle of Talas was only one battle. China trusted its allies but was back-stabbed. Using nomads to fight against nomads is a cheaper military alternative.
But there have been hundreds of battles and military campaigns.
So one or two or even three battles where foreign troops fought together with Chinese troops as mercenaries or allies do not mean that China relied on foreign troops all the time or even most of the time.
BTW, the Battle of Talas was a victory likely deliberately conceded by China. China had reached what she considered as her natural territorial limits. And the Arabs would be satisfied with a ‘victory’ after a whole series of defeats. So both China and the Arabs co-existed peacefully after that.
That was one of the reasons why even the founder of Islam implored the Muslims to learn from China.
I’ve seen mainlanders have meltdowns reading uncensored wikipedia, so I know that it is nearly impossible to dent their brainwashed chavinism, they simply have to learn these things for themselves.
Anyway, nomad recruitment and settlement was official policy for centuries. China permanently lost control of the Central Asian Silk route after the Battle of Talas.
Hahaha! I have also came across Westerners brainwashed by the CIA.
And why don you think China want to ‘control’ the silk roads? China was self-sufficient and generated enough wealth and more without foreign trade. It was the foreigners who wanted to trade with China – something allowed with strict limits and locations by China.
So it was the foreigners who wanted to control the trade routes to China and the East – Arabs, Mongols and Europeans.
Marco Polo was overwhelmed by the wealth and splendour of China.
Please go on a course on authentic Chinese history.
But Buddhism is basically pacifist in its teachings, especially the type brought to China by the Indian Buddhist monk – Bodhidharma. It teaches detachment from the affairs of this world as a means to avert suffering. That’s why they medidate.
But because of its vast following, the religion is politicised and adapted in the countries of its adoption. E.g. the Dalai Lama. But even he sticks with the basis pacifism of Buddhism. Sometimes it is politicised and then militarised. E.g. your army of Buddhist monks and Zen Buddhism.
But basically it is a pacifist religion and not a Western concept.
Bodhidharma is a semi-mythological character. The notion that Buddhism is ‘world denying’ was a theory of the Victorian era. Buddhist meditate in search of the Ultimate Truth. As Jesus declared in the Oxyrynchus Manuscript ‘The Kingdom of Heaven lies within you’. Buddhism isn’t vast, it is only medium sized in terms of world religions. Apart from in Myanmar and Sri Lanka, Buddhists generally avoid politics. The Dalai Lama…I wondered when you would get to ‘The Great Splittist’. He was indeed a ruling monarch in his youth, but now he’s just a kindly old monk. The Shaolin martial arts novices who bravely volunteered to defend Imperial China from marauding Japanese pirates would probably not appeciate your characterisation of them as ‘politicised and then militarised’. Other ‘pacifist’ Buddhists include Gurkhas, Mongols, Transbaikal Cossacks and my personal favouirite Freiherr von Ungern-Sternberg.
Hadjuk, but in China, the pacifist strain of Buddhism was and is dominant. China need to watch this and balance with a good appreciation of Sun Tzu.
The martial Buddhist Shaolin monks were an exception. These monks won’t use their martial arts ecept to overcome evil.
As for Bodhidharma, he is an actual historical figure as far as the Shaolin Temple is concerned. Chinese martial arts attributed its beginnings to his teachings. But Bodhidharma taught the monks martial arts for health and exercise only.
So who are you to dispute the story of his origins against the historical records of the Shaolin temple?
As for those barbarians you referred to, they are all the same in that they used a good invention for war and plunder. The Chinese originally used gunpowder for fireworks.
They were forced to innovate it for defence by the plundering Mongols.
As often happens, a mythological figure and an actual Buddhist missionary, or more likely two missionaries, have been conflated into ‘Bodhidharma’ the great founder of Ch’an.
Since I used to lecture on this subject, I don’t think I’ll be doing your course on ‘authentic’ Chinese history, by which you presumably mean state approved history.
Ungern-Sternberg is a fascinating historical character, there is no anti-Chinese bias at all in my referencing him (incidentally he also massacred Jews and Russian Bolsheviks).
Simon, the Saker Community has many contibutors with extremely specialist knowledge and skills, so instead of challenging everything that is new to you (on the assumption that it is false), my advice would be to instead use this information to do your own research and to reach your own conclusions. If someone on this site talks about the Crimea you should assume that they actually are in the Crimea.
What’s “new” to you is authentic Chinese history. Why don’t you do some research in this viewpoint?
My previous comment seems to have been disallowed for some unknown reason. But I shall re-post some of the points.
I know that many in the Saker community have specialised knowledge. But having specialised knowledge in certain subjects does not mean they know everything and I don’t think they generally think this way.
But you have made many assumptions which I pointed out. E.g. China did not dare to invade North Vietnam; China’s ‘crushing’ defeat at the battle of Talas; China wanted to control the silk road; China is not a ‘martial’ nation; China’s “military mandarins were never on the same level as their civilian counterparts, which is why China used client armies”; just to name a few. These are simplistic assumptions unexpected from a history lecturer.
You made the mistake of using a single incident to generalise or to generalise from a generalisation. I would not be able to pass my university entrance exams durig my teenage years if I used such generalisations in my answers.
Just for your info the word Dharma means path and can be translated to religion. Bodi Dharma means the religion of Bodi. In India this is the word used for Buddha. Essentially in many Indian language BodiDharma essentially means Buddisim. I no knowledge of who or how Buddhism(ieboudi Dharma) travelled to china.also Hindu religion is called Sanatan Dharma. The word Hindu is Arabic in origin and the Sanatan Dharma is essentially the religion of those who follow Vedas and puranas centered upon bhrahmanical view of socitey. There were and still many idol worshiping people not organised with books or deep philosophy who were colliquially clubbed by Arabs as Hindus eventually they were appropriated by Sanatan Dharma. Now most are called Hindus for lack of better name. Now even those who are incorporated or yet to be incorporated but are just local worshippers who have nothing to do with Sanatan Vedas, bhrahmanical border or philosophy call themselves Hindus albeit of different caste. Even understanding of caste among these is not as per Sanatan Dharma.
BTW, the Gurkhas are Hindus and not Buddhists.
The Gurkha peoples are evenly divided between both faiths; the Chetri are Hindu, whereas the Gurung and Tamang are (Tibetan) Buddhist.
My apologies Simon, some of my comments were indeed a bit imbalenced.
Buddhism is of course dedicated to non-violence (ahimsa). Ungern-Sternberg is a unique case. A real Buddhist saint did found the Ch’an meditative tradition (but the texts and exercises were probably the work of others). Not all of traditional Chinese culture was destroyed in the PRC during the Cultural Revolution. There are some sizeable surviving fragments, but alas it is questionable whether these will be enough in the long term. I have dedicated much of my life to trying to preserve Chinese culture, so this state of affairs is depressing in the extreme. From the Imperial Chinese perspective the Battle of Talas was an irrelevant skirmish against far-flung savages. Imperial China had a similar lack of concern with the mercantile concerns of the Silk Road.
As far as the Sino-Vietnamese conflict of 1979 is concerned it is worth remembering that historically Vietnam defeated Mongol armies on two separate occasions. ‘The road to Hanoi is open’ doesn’t mean that the PLA ever had any chance of overrunning Vietnam. They advanced about twenty kilometres with severe losses and then withdrew having failed to achieve their objectives. In the PRC you only learn about ‘The Defensive Counter-attack against Vietnam’ and never about ‘The War against Chinese Expansionism’, so in a Western university exam your marks would likely suffer. Anyway, I quit academia more than twenty years ago so I am scarcely in a position to judge.
My use of the word ‘martial’ was also an error on my part as it appears to refer to the discredited and racist British notion of ‘martial races’. I have my own theory in this regard, derived from Chinese philosophy, but it’s off-topic. Describing the PRC as akin to Disneyland was an offensive comment and a gross generalisation. There are many tragically bad reconstructions in modern China, like Shaolin Temple, but this is not to deny that overall the achievements of Communist China have been truly amazing. I have talked with Chinese elders who remember pre-war China, where countless peasants lived in the most extreme poverty imaginable. Millions posssesed little more than a loincloth. To have pulled up such a vast nation into prosperity and modernity in only seventy years is a stunning accomplishment.
China is also quite correct in maintaining its state socialism. Unfetteted capitalism is inherantly self-destructive, and as we are now witnessing first hand it is also uncaring. China clearly does not consider its own people to be a herd of animals or a basket of deplorables like our shameful Western governments.
In commerce China will inevitably steamroll the West. Chinese merchant families produce top notch entrepreneurs in every generation, whereas Western nations only rarely produce such people. Their cooperative and clan business associations are also much superior to anything found in the West.
The only reason why I harshly criticise the People’s Republc on this forum is because I wholeheartedly support the Eurasian Project, and I therefore wish for China to be able to ‘step up to the plate’ as quickly as possible. Ethnically cleasing minorities and disappearring dissidents is barbarism, and a sign of sickness in a nation. China must put these things behind them and get well soon, for all our sakes.
Lastly, from the perspective of the ancient cultures of Persia, India, and China, Northern Europeans are indeed ‘barbarians’. The first Europeans were exactly like their later descendents the Scythians; they excelled at music, religion and art, but their primary accomplishment was always predatory warfare.
https://www.earth.com/news/violent-tribes-conquered-europe/
In the words of the ‘Labour Church Hymnbook’ (1898) No.23;
‘Lord, make the nations see
That men should brothers be
and form one family
The wide world o’er.’
As for your favourite Buddhist Freiherr von Ungern-Sternberg, I noted your jibe. But he, like all the others including the Japanese, took advantage of a China in transition.
For this, the Chinese blamed their own weakness and not the barbarians whom they knew for millennia.
Famous pacifist Buddhist groups include Gurkhas, Burmese, Mongols and Cossacks.
It would have helped if you had put dates to the periods of history you are referring to.
You claim China was “centuries behind” in navigation. The Chinese actually invented the compass (10th century) . Also, gunpowder (9th Century).
Surely both these inventions must have been helpful to the W. European naval conquererors of the 15th& 16th century?
It would be more accurate to state that China discovered the magnetic properties of iron before that same discovery was independently made elsewhere, but again, I’ll concede the point on them being centuries behind Europe.
Their ships were definitely inferior though. Try and sail a junk rigged vessel close to the wind and you’ll see what I mean. This is important. As I’ve pointed out, the wind patterns in that part of the world are not favorable in terms of eastward travel. The voyage out to Africa or India would be easy enough, but returning presents a major challenge as it’s entirely against the prevailing winds. As for the Pacific, there’s just too much water before you reach land of any significance. Then there’s the storms that are common in those waters which will sink all but the best built ship.
To clarify, prevailing winds were so important in the age of sail that it was often easier to circumnavigate than to try and return via the way you came. Read up on attempts to round Cape Horn from the east for some striking examples.
Hahaha! Apparently you do not know how to sail a ‘junk’. And there are evidence that China through another admiral, sailed off from Zheng He’s fleet and circumnavigate the globe. Another one went top Australia and South as far as Antarctica. But no clear-cut evidence so far.
Zheng He’s ships were designed to sail the oceans. Compare this with Alfonso d’Albuquerque’s (conqueror of Malacca in 1511) fleet which ran into a storm and sank just north of the Straits of Malacca with all the loot he plundered from Malacca..
Another Admiral from Zheng He’s fleet also branched off to the North pole. Zheng He managed to calculate and determined the longitudes of the earth – something the west did not (somewhat) achieved until the 18th century i.e. about 300 years later.
13,000 years ago colonizers reached western S. America from Micronesia. There were non-incidental trips between western Africa and Central America long before Columbus and his marauders arrived in the Caribbean. Agriculture developed simultaneously in the New World and the Fertile Crescent. South American non-ferrous metallurgy was highly advanced at at time when Europeans were practicing alchemy. ‘Modern’ medicine is still striving to unlock secrets of Amazonian medicine. The stone structures of Machu Picchu are standing, w/out cement, 700yrs. in a seismic zone, because of the construction techniques employed.
And yet, where are they now?
In my study of anthropology I’ve found the theory with the most explanatory power to be Cultural Materialism (see Marvin Harris).
Under that rubric, North and South American cultures reached their Malthusian Limit due to lack of domestic animals, primarily horses and cattle. With horses you have a draft animal allowing for expansion of food production, plus the ability to project military force. With cattle, you have a draft animal and a ready source of protein. Absent both, you eventually reach the limits of growth and your civilization regresses to the condition in which Cortés found the Aztecs.
None of these people disappeared, they simply regressed to a former state since they could no longer sustain their level of civilization. The Great Horse Culture of the Lakota People supports the general theory. Spanish horses (previously unknown) were rapidly adopted and led to the expansion and territorial dominance of the Lakota which lasted until the lying dog-faced pony soldiers arrived, likewise on horseback, but with superior arms.
Europe, Central Asia and the Far East had horses and cattle from ancient times, and where the land was fertile, territorial expansion and further refinements followed their natural course.
@ebear,
Do you know why China has stuck with the characters? It is because the characters were designed to allow speakers of different languages to communicate with one another throughout China — i.e. it is the lingua franca of China. We now think of these languages as “dialects” because China is one unified political entity but they are actually mutually unintelligible. So, instead of having to learn multiple languages to transmit information effectively across China’s vast territory, the people just learned one writing system.
Removed – link faulty. Mod.
My first language is English. Because I learned the Roman Alphabet in school, I was able to learn French and Spanish very quickly, and from that, I can also read Portuguese and Italian with relatively little difficulty. I learned the Cyrillic alphabet in about an hour when I started studying Russian, and had not too much trouble with Gurmukhi when I studied Punjabi, although it is not a true phonetic script, as it doesn’t separate vowels and consonants. I can also read Hiragana and Katakana for the same reason – relative simplicity.
In my study of Japanese, I hit a brick wall with Kanji. Likewise when I studied Mandarin. I can read some characters of course, but in fact I’m effectively illiterate, which is very frustrating as I’m mainly a visual learner.
Incidentally, Hiragana was developed for the exact reason that Kanji was deemed too difficult for general use, and was first adopted by women of the court as they were not granted the same level of education as men. It’s now an integral part of modern Japanese which can’t be written without it. Korea followed a similar path.
Chinese characters are beautiful and well worth learning if you have the time, as are Egyptian hieroglyphics, but since time is the major constrain in acquiring new knowledge, phonetic scripts are functionally better. If this weren’t true, they wouldn’t be in widespread use today.
Also worth noting is that back in the 50’s the PRC began a program of character simplification which continues to this day. I doubt they would have embarked on such a huge undertaking if their writing system were as efficient as some claim.
I have wondered if the Chinese language of pictographs has made it easier for Chinese to learn coding and software. . Although not a coder I have looked into it. The little I learned made me wonder (I also only know little about the Chinese language) if the way pictographs are built up is similar to the way coding uses sequences that build on each other, combine with others to get the desired result
@Anonymous,
China may have simplified the characters but the characters remain a non-phonetic logographic representation of language. You should also note that Taiwan and Hong Kong have retained the characters in their traditional forms.
I’m not necessarily disputing your argument that phonetic writing systems are more efficient. I’m merely suggesting that China’s writing system has its own advantages and there’s a reason why not only China but the Sinosphere (China plus Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Chinese Malaysians) as well have stubbornly stuck with the characters when countries such as Korea and Vietnam have replaced the characters with phonetic scripts.
The problem is that a phonological romanization of Chinese, such as pinyin, is extremely lossy. Because it loses etymological information, it is too ambiguous in practice and lacks expressiveness. There are many syllables that have several meanings and each essential meaning is represented by a different character. (A typical word is made of 2 syllables that each have an autonomous meaning that contributes somehow to the meaning of the combination.) Even 2-syllable words can be ambiguous. For example, you3yi4 can mean either beneficial (有益) or friendship (友谊). But it’s not just a clarity issue. If you don’t represent word etymology, you are leaving out information about the lexical structure of the language. It is as if in French, you switched to a phonological writing that wrote the following words in the same way: au, aux, eau, eaux, oh, aulx, haut, hauts, ô. But in fact it is much worse because of the way different 2-syllable words containing one particular etymological syllable (represented by one symbol) are akin in meaning. For instance, in the word for friend, peng2you3 (朋友), you won’t be surprised to find the syllable you3 represented by the same character 友 that you find in the word for friendship.
@Anonymous
I’m not sure if this is a good metaphor, but, for me at least, the Japanese language’s use of three different writing systems (hiragana, katakana and kanji), compared with Chinese and Korean using only one, is evocative of the differences between Lucky Charms and regular Cheerios, or Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries and regular Cap’n Crunch. It’s amazing how three different writing systems can natively go hand-in-hand in one language.
The average Chinese intellectual cnows some 3ooo-4500 characters and that is quite enough for anyone unless he wants to read the classics and older texts in their original un-annotated woodblock versions. I know from having studied Classical Chinese, linguistics and East Asian Ancient history at Peking University (BĕiDà).
The standard set of high school Kanji in Japan is 1800, so not far off China, where today 3 to 4 thousand will suffice for general communication. Bear in mind though that we’re talking about ancient times when most people were illiterate, and when admittance to government positions required a detailed knowledge of the language, and for which extremely tough annual exams were held. Not everyone made the cut.
General literacy only became a thing in the last couple of centuries. For much of human history, writing was the exclusive domain of the elite, and in some places it was forbidden to even teach it to commoners. The printing press and moveable type changed all that. You need less than 100 type pieces to print most western languages. The sheer volume of Chinese type pieces needed made printing an expensive undertaking, which restricted the amount of written material that could be disseminated.
On point 2 Those states that grew up around the sea of middle earth were always faced with the quandry of having an increasingly unsupportable large army/aristocracy and it being too small to defend itself from opportunist wilder tribes from beyond the rim of ‘civilisation’. Thus uniting with rivals to face common enemies was always fraught and rarely handled well or timely. Since the Romans were the only power to sieze command of the middle earth sea theirs was the only empire that ‘united’ those states.
Today’s China cannot turn inward. Too many people to feed. It’s that simple. China cannot defeat the poverty, create a modest middle class and keep quality food on the table of all its people without trade. It must import food.
In order to have a maritime fleet for trade, it must have access to all the oceans and seas. Therefore, China must have a large naval force.
In order to have an overland trade route, through Eurasian connectivity, it must have a large military to help secure the route, the installations along the way, to assist its neighbors and partners in the Eurasia Integration.
In order to do all the above, China has to have a dynamic economy. It has to be a rich nation, producing products the world wants to buy. In order to accomplish that, it must import other strategic materials and commodities.
China has to have a very active society just to maintain itself day to day.
It will never be otherwise. Though the US will do everything under the sun to slow it, stop it, contain it, damage it and maybe even destroy parts of it.
While he is preoccupied with the bug, perhaps we can get something done.
I agree Larchmonter, that China will continue to engage with the rest of the world.
They have learned the lesson from the Qing dynasty when they thought they were self sufficient, but clearly not self-sufficient militarily.
Btw, regarding their food supply: I read that China would be able to produce enough food if their livestock wasn’t constantly dying in weird virus outbreaks.. (First it was the chickens during the avian flu, then the pigs during swine flu…) Another reason to develop reliable trading relationships: like this they’re hedged if something happens to their home-grown produce..
They will be embracing Russian agriculture more and more. With a long shared border, they will always be assured of supply. Getting food from Latin America will be blockaded if worse turns to worst. Also, naval blockades means their enormous fish and seafood supply will be seriously interrupted.
@Larchmonter445,
China gets most of its fish from aquaculture (two-thirds of the total output, I think) so I don’t know if access to fish supplies is an important consideration.
Aquaculture . particularly that of Tilapia, has been suggested as a magnifier of the Covid 19 outbreak in Wuhan, and has also been associated with the Korean Shincheonji church cluster.Given also the massive doses of insecticide needed for farmed salmon,for example,I don’t see it as a reliable,safe source of food.
Nah, the Chinese will diversify its external food source. But will ensure at least 75-80% of its food supplies are produced at home.
The fat lady will sing for the absolute end of “western power,” when China, in cooperation with Russia, and probably with the Koreas, achieves the Holy Grail of fusion power, highly possible by 2049. Then, it will move to hydrogen fuel instead of fossil hydrocarbons, where necessary, and have unlimited energy for massive vertical farming and aquaculture operations to feed its cities, and for the recycling of essential resources. When China doesn’t need the rest of the world, perhaps it will retreat again like the Ming dynasty, but without the same risk to its future.
It’s a little off-topic, but I was excited when I read my first article on fusion, which was soon to be developed, in 1968. The joke is that fusion is the energy of the future … and always will be. Fusion may or may not be achieved but it is completely irrelevant. Fission can already supply unlimited amounts of energy. Fast reactors (leader is Russia) or thermal neutron thorium reactors, use all of the available energy in uranium or thorium. That energy source will last for tens of thousands of years. A single thorium mine in the US contains enough to supply all energy in America … for 500 years.
Hydrogen is NOT an energy source. There are no hydrogen mines. It is a transmission technology for energy. But, it is vastly inferior to the current energy transmission system … the electrical grid.
The future is nuclear (fission) power, plus EV’s, heat pumps, etc. which derive their energy from the electrical grid.
The point is that, with “unlimited energy,” it becomes economical to generate hydrogen by electrolysis, as a combustible fuel at the point where fuelling is conducted. It’s very unlikely that fighter aircraft, for example, will be connected to transmission lines or rely on batteries for motive power. Not to mention that electric BBQs don’t generate quite the flavours that flames do, and most chefs prefer gas ranges.
The problem with this of course is the issue of nuclear waste which remains deadly for hundreds of millennia. Energy is a mere BYPRODUCT of nuclear power, waste is its principal product. The energy produced is quickly consumed whereas the waste remains with us forever in all practical human terms.
I thought China could be self sufficient from its own land as far as food goes. I was reading about all their hybrid rice techniques as well as their development of sodic and saline hybrids that can grow in what used to be sodic/saline wasteland.
China must import food? Larchmonter445, you are a bit behind on China.
That’s why the usual culprits are targeting China’s agriculture. The swine flu was only a test run. They will go for the rice and wheat production of China next.
Interesting article on Chinese past by Escobar, though I would dispute some of his claims about the Zheng He expeditions. These cost more to operate than any economic results they brought back to China. They also cost many lives among their crews. In those days disease and poor nutrition killed off huge numbers of sailors, especially when packed together in such large numbers as in these fleets. This isn’t dispute the great feat which these voyages accomplished, they just didn’t turn a profit, which wasn’t really their purpose to begin with. They were not a maritime silk road.
@vot tak,
If you find that it seems incredible about the voyages of Admiral Zheng He, please read the books “When China Ruled the Seas – The Treasure Fleet of the Dragon Throne” by Louise Levathes and the somewhat controversial (By european standards who claim that all things were “discovered” by them) “1421-The Year China Discovered America” by Gavin Menzies. Both books well researched and worth a read. You can also go to many places where the Admiral placed markers of their voyages that are still maintained in Africa to this day.
What is determinant today is that the center of gravity of the economy-world, for the fist time in the historical era of Modernity, is moving outside of the sphere of a Christian Western Europe and its geographic extensions. Today the center of gravity of the economy-world is moving towards East-Asia which is the sphere of the Chinese civilization and the worldviews of Taoism, Confucianism and Chinese Buddhism.
Given its size China sits in the driver’s seat at the center of gravity, of the new economy-world, forming in East-Asia. This is the reason why Pepe is right to suggest that “what matters is to find the deeper roots of Beijing’s strategy – what the Chinese learned from their own rich history and how they are applying these lessons as a re-emerging major power in the young 21st century”.
But to find valid answer to these question we need first to address the following :
1. Why do China and the West appear so otherworldly to each other.
The answer resides in the radically different approaches taken by China and the Middle-East during the transition from the tribal model of society to the power model of society (empires and kingdoms).
– The Early Chinese empire kept animism as its worldview and the Chinese civilization is thus animistic which means that it inherited the knowledge base of animism that had been accumulated over the earlier tens of thousands of years…
– The ME largely replaced the worldview of animism by religious narratives that were steeped in power relationships
These religious narratives were a-fortiori ideological constructs that are totally detached from the production of their daily life by the people. No wonder “Judeo-Christian sadomasochism focused on imposing suffering as virtue as the path to reach Paradise”. This contrasts with ‘Chinese animism+’ (animism + evolutionary add-ons) which was a sum of the pragmatic principles that guide people to avoid suffering in the production of their daily lives (Chinese cuisine, Chinese Traditional Medicine, …). But more importantly these worldviews that originated power societies also imposed radically different axioms of civilization to China and the empires of the ME and later Europe. In short :
– in China polarism became the foundational axiom. Yin-Yang are the 2 poles of every phenomena. All phenomena are thus viewed as constantly changing realities. And so the relation with the other is not viewed through an ideological lens but is motivating curiosity and acceptance of the differences. And being pragmatic the Chinese are always ready to learn and adopt what works from the other…
– in the ME dualism became the foundational axiom. Good me Westerner versus the different and evil other. Result : racism, xenophobia, colonialism, imperialism, violence and so on.
Over the long haul these axioms of civilization retreated from the conscious mind to the subconscious so people are no longer aware that their thought system is founded on such axioms. But the reality is that people’s thinking is driven by them.
2. How could a backward Europe possibly have imposed Modernity to the whole world ?
Two factors are determinant :
– the formation of individualism and its growth in Western minds was driven by Catholicism which encouraged people to communicate directly with the christian god in order to abandon animism or natural pantheism. Following animism China has always been irreligious and its people adhered to a form of communalism.
– following the crusades long distance trade, starting in the 12-13th centuries, unleashed the conversion of the merchants into believing in ‘the reason that is at work within capital’. China learned what is capital very late …from Marx. European Early-Modernity was thus driven by Commercial capitalism which sustained the primitive accumulation of capital that later would finance industrial capitalism. Imperial China reserved long distance trade as a monopoly in the hands of the state this is why money never transformed into capital under the Chinese empire.
The Abrahamic religions are all false religions. They arose after “the Fall” about 6,000 years ago. Primitive religions which are based on oral narratives from generation to generation still have stories about what life was like on Earth 6,000 years ago. Supposedly it was Paradise where the lions laid down with the lambs, and human beings did not experience terrible strife. Animism also contains this age old wisdom. The West cannot control oral traditions like they can control written versions.
That is why the Abrahamic religions are compelled to scour the globe and eliminate this wisdom and to spread their evil with wars, including their preferred method of bio-warfare which they have perfected. They have to exterminate primitive civilizations to keep the Truth from becoming widespread. That would threaten their dominance, because if enough people learned the Truth, they would experience freedom and happiness unlike the current conditions. The evil ones would lose their power.
The royal families (who interbreed) experienced a boon when all of those people migrated to Europe due to the death and destruction that the evil ones perpetrated in the Middle East, because the evil ones were able to kidnap tens of thousands of children from the melee. Abductions of children occurs on an extremely vast scale unreported by the controlled media. If investigators get to close to the evil ones, their efforts are thwarted by the system.
They are indeed evil. They practice rituals that involve the abuse of children and human sacrifices. The British nobility are a good example of this. That is why Epstein “committed suicide,” as it is often repeated in the controlled media. This evil elite is responsible for the world wars and many other wars, assassinations, especially televised assassinations like JFK, 911, financial collapses, and the current COVID crisis with its destruction of the economy which will be followed by starvation, more diseases, and WW3.
It is our frightful duty to study the talmud ….a poem by Alice Walker……….
The first time I was accused
Of appearing to be anti-Semitic
The shock did not wear off
For days.
The man who charged me
Was a friend.
A Jewish Soul
Who I thought understood
Or could learn to understand
Almost anything.
He could not understand
However
Why I thought Israel should give back
The land it took
From a poorly defended
People in a war that lasted
Six days. I cringed
About our small house
In Mississippi (where black people
Often assumed he was a racist)
Deeply offended by his attempt
To insult my character
And spoke to him
Earnestly of “dignity” “justice”
“honor” and “peace.”
Sometimes, later in life,
You do laugh at yourself.
You understand, finally,
That you’ve understood
Nothing. Nothing at all.
That in this case, for instance,
That of the famed Six Day War,
It was all a show,
A true “Theatre” war;
The battlefield a stage,
Though bombs and bullets were real.
Only the people who lost the battle
Got a close-up
Of the set.
And the set-up.
Later I would march
Or be arrested
Protesting this war and that
And marvel how it never mattered.
On days we marched in our tens of thousands
The people we hoped to influence
Were taking a holiday. Bush was
good at this. He let the media
Spread the word he was chillin’ on his
12,000 or is it 20,000
Acre ranch.
Bill and Barack made themselves
Scarce.
When I was in Palestine
As an elder
Doing my job
Of keeping tabs
On Earth’s children
I remembered my concern
And how my friend
Had brushed it off.
“Israel needs that land to protect itself.”
He said. As though this should be
Self- evident. It wasn’t then;
It isn’t now.
The land taken
Has never been returned.
In fact, more stolen land
Has followed the first assaults
And thefts.
Palestinian children, after years
Of throwing stones
At grown up assassins
In helmets and armored tanks
Are killing themselves
These days
To save their murderers
The trouble.
Unlike most Americans
I have witnessed Palestine
Under Israeli rule. It is demonic
To the core. But where to look
For the inspiration
For so much evil? Where
To find the teachings that influence
And sanction such limitless cruel behavior?
Where to find that part
Of the puzzle that is missing?
We’ve intuited there must be one.
And we were right.
*
We must go back
As grown ups, now,
Not as the gullible children we once were,
And study our programming,
From the beginning.
All of it: The Christian, the Jewish,
The Muslim; even the Buddhist. All of it, without exception,
At the root.
For the study of Israel, of Gaza, of Palestine,
Of the bombed out cities of the Middle East,
Of the creeping Palestination
Of our police, streets, and prisons
In America,
Of war in general,
It is our duty, I believe, to study The Talmud.
It is within this book that,
I believe, we will find answers
To some of the questions
That most perplex us.
Where to start?
You will find some information,
Slanted, unfortunately,
By Googling. For a more in depth study
I recommend starting with YouTube. Simply follow the trail of “The
Talmud” as its poison belatedly winds its way
Into our collective consciousness.
Some of what you find will sound
Too crazy to be true. Unfortunately those bits are likely
To be true. Some of the more evasive studies
Will exhibit unbelievable attempts
At sugar coating extremely disagreeable pills.
But hang in there, checking
And double checking, listening to everybody,
Even the teachers with the twisted pasts
That scare you the most,
And the taped rants of outraged citizens that sound
Like madcap characters on Car Talk
Except they are not laughing
But are righteously outraged.
Study hard, with an open
If deeply offended mind,
Until you can sift the false
From the true.
Is Jesus boiling eternally in hot excrement,
For his “crime” of throwing the bankers
Out of the Temple? For loving, standing with,
And defending
The poor? Was his mother, Mary,
A whore?
Are Goyim (us) meant to be slaves of Jews, and not only
That, but to enjoy it?
Are three year old (and a day) girls eligible for marriage and intercourse?
Are young boys fair game for rape?
Must even the best of the Goyim (us, again) be killed?
Pause a moment and think what this could mean
Or already has meant
In our own lifetime.
You may find that as the cattle
We have begun to feel we are
We have an ancient history of oppression
Of which most of us have not been even vaguely
Aware. You will find that we, Goyim, sub-humans, animals
-The Palestinians of Gaza
The most obvious representatives of us
At the present time – are a cruel example of what may be done
With impunity, and without conscience,
By a Chosen people,
To the vast majority of the people
On the planet
Who were not Chosen.
Not chosen to receive the same dubious
“Blessing” of
Supremacy over the Earth,
Humans, and Beasts of this realm. As is
Stated plainly in the first chapter
Of the Bible we all read.
The Unchosen who, until now,
Were too scared of being
Called names
To demand to know why.
It is a “Blessing” Jesus did not want.
One that, risking crucifixion, he refused.
One reason he is loved
By those who recognize a good
And righteous person
When they encounter one.
Seen in this light he wasn’t even
A spiritual progressive, but a committed
Revolutionary: a Che Guevara
Of the ancient past.
A past as scary, if not scarier, than
Our own time: A past that,
Unfortunately, is not even past (quoting
Faulkner).
We discover this
To our enlightened grief
As we study
The Talmud,
Our own ignorance,
And the devastating impact of both
On our abandoned world.
###
This book is the problem and not the said religions….. a fact.
An obvious problem for both Europe and the USA going forward into this century is that they have very little or none of the raw materials necessary beneath their own soils, and the days are gone when by brute force they could just take them, although that hasn’t meant they’ve stopped trying eg: middle eastern and Venezuelan Oil and South American Lithium reserves. The Platinum group metals necessary for vehicle catalytic converters are in S.Africa and Russia although I believe the US has some, its less than 10% of available resources. Once upon a time having Oak, Iron, Lead, Coal & Steel was all you needed in terms of the materials needed to get your Empire going, stuff that was in plentiful abundance inthe Atlantic facing nations. Going forward to the future the materials set has changed, the rare earth Elements, Tungsten, and other resources belong to someone else, and the only realistic option is to trade, either that or a War that nobody will win. Problem is, going forward, is what with ?
The problem of course is a system that has to feed on itself, the never ending profit or cease to exist,as the one Russian leader stated back in the cold war days “we don’t need to destroy you, for you will destroy yourself chasing the profit” and that day has finally arrived, and now its only a matter of time and I say good-bye to a system that never worked except for the few.!!!!
Nice article. China had everything it needed so closed itself off from outsiders. Honourable idea, but in leaving others alone they made the mistake of allowing yet further away others to benefit from those resources, leaving those further away others to eventually prove stronger than China by forcing opium on China even though the Chinese authorities didn’t want such goods. Of course, during the opium period, or the Century of Humiliation, China was not ruled by the Chinese, but by the Manchus. Most of Chinese history seems to have been characterized by the rule of non-Chinese. The expansions were during the non-Chinese rule phases.
But this in no way exonerates the current China from being a creation of the NeoCon West. The West transferred all manufacturing and industry to China. Why some places were only supposed to supply raw materials to the West (thanks World Bank and IMF) while one other place in particular was turned into the manufacturing powerhouse? The current China is a product of Globalization, Globalization is bad, therefore the current China is … Just as bad is the opposite side of the coin, the social aspect of Globalization, namely the immigrant invasion, oops sorry I meant invitation, in certain places.
‘…even though the Chinese authorities didn’t want such goods’. The Scottish smugglers were only able to distribute opium throughout China in partnership with the Chinese Mandarins. The idea of ‘foreign brigands’ being responsible is obviously easier than facing the harsh reality that one’s own leaders were to blame.
China also didn’t shut itself off after Zheng He as Pepe suggests.
‘One popular belief holds that after Zheng’s voyages, China turned away from the seas and underwent a period of technological stagnation. Although historians such as John Fairbank and Joseph Needham popularized this view in the 1950s, most current historians of China question its accuracy. They point out that Chinese maritime commerce did not stop after Zheng He, that Chinese ships continued to dominate Southeast Asian commerce until the 19th century and that active Chinese trading with India and East Africa continued long after the time of Zheng’. (Wikipedia)
But China did stood down her military in favour of state pacifism.
The moral of the story is “you snooze you lose”. Russia nearly did just that in Ukraine, they left Ukraine alone and to its own devices and so the USA stepped into the vacuum and staged a “colour revolution” there. Luckily Russia woke up in time to save Crimea and stalemate Donetsk and Lugansk. Snoozing is not a virtue to be eulogized.
Very true. You snooze, you lose. Like the hare racing the tortoise. But Russia still lost Ukraine proper, at least the Banderaist portion of Ukraine.
But I always wondered why can’t Ukraine be independent? She was independent before Russia conquered it in 1828.
The Chinese are Businessmen plain and simple. The people of the West are Barbarians that plunder, steal and engage in Usury.
Ok, so it is interesting to see that China is not historically imperialistic and violent. The same can’t be said of western powers. We appear to now be at the apex of this western imperialism. Some sort of showdown is inevitable.
I’m not sure why Pepe said Europe discovered the earth was round in the 1600’s because looking back from our day a Greek mathematician had already proved it and calculated the circumference of the planet more than 2000 years ago.
One thing that grates on me with some of Pepe’s articles, as much as I enjoy reading them, and he has done this before, is to make a broad-brush statement which is condemnatory of Christianity. “Judeo-Christian sadomasochism imposing suffering as a virtue and the only path to paradise:. Do you not understand that the ancient Church, the One Holy, Catholic (in the true and broader meaning) and Apostolic Church is not so much like all the other schismatic, heretical types? Suffering can be a virtue and produce virtue when it is suffered for doing good and for loving our God. We don’t lust for suffering but expect it and we certainly do not try to bring suffering on any others. Just the opposite is the case. But anyone reading the statement above would be put off from ever looking at Christians in a good light.
I can understand why the Chinese would look at white-skinned people as devils. We are not all devils and this is a weakness for them. Xi doesn’t view Vladimir Putin as a devil but as a great friend. Being absorbed by the hive mind can prevent a person from seeing the truth. Many in the west, fully propagandized into the hive mind hate China. They never stop to consider that what they are taught is false. This is going to become very clear soon in the west. Here in Canada, there is heavy demonization of China by the political parties, especially the opposition. We now have a bigger problem. A minority government led by a young punk globalist who is now behaving like a dictator and none of the others are doing a thing to stop him. Wait until they soon come up with a vaccine so we can ‘go back to normal’ and they make it mandatory. Persecution time is here in the free west.
There is no seperation. Human Being is a nature form. Color depends upon skin protection via elements. The historical accounting depends upon the writers and the publishers. Hemispheres, East West North South grow a variety of ENERGY. All life is/are energy/ies. The worst of our species (earth? energy/ies?) are not in a higher Emotional Quotient (EQ) NOR IQ frequency/ies. Past is never concrete, now isn’t etched in stone. Future? Dare to Dream cos Dreamer & Dream are same. I lived in Asia, I practice Yung Seng Feng Earth Style Tai Chi. Am a stone Carver 72 yrs young. Humans doing are busy doing. Humans Being are Baguazhan Feng Shui practicing eternity.
Saker, your blog (& Voltaire’s) BEST, THANKS
Fact is that the life philosophy of the East especially Tao, Yin and Yang and its related thoughts are more adept being for the 21st century as well as for the coming centuries afterwards.
We will never get to know if a God exists or not. Physics has showed that particles can be created out of nothing. Or better to say that “nothing” doesn’t exists in reality. or even “nothing” holds creativity in itself.
Our earth history goes usually somehow round from East to West and again from West to East and so on.
I, as a Middle European, don’t still understand why our culture has the belief that only the “white people” should manage our earth as well as only we are entitled for science and its developments etc. And the same goes with the religion especially Roman-Catholic which has all this ingredients from the Roman Empire’s way of thinking namely: every country, ethnicity, culture or other religious belief is wrong and barbarian. Roman-Catholic had been introduced more as a state-religion (starting 3rd and 4th century AD) and as such has been enforced onto any other ethnicity and/or culture since (and with it millions of murdered people). Remark: Not by the smaller Italian country but by other “Kings” in Europe I think it started at about 750 AD when King “Karl the Great” went to the pope in Rom n order to be crowned !
Most “wonders” attributed to Jesus can be read in Pharaonic hyroglyphic Papyri (scriptures) more than 3500 years old (also attributed to some deities usually).
And Maria, mother of Jesus, is a exact copy of Isis quite often depicted holding Horus her child onto her knees. Pictures and scriptures more than 4000 years old. Admired, honored, worshipped and asked for help (by women mostly) even in the Old Roman Empire until 6th century AD until totally forbidden.
And if a god exists and earthly people want to honor its creation (if such an extraordinary entity needs something like this which I doubt greatly !!) they should think that we humans have an excellent brain which should be used regularly thus honoring our creator.
In my opinion Asia and especially China shows great advancements insofar as it gained a way of thinking namely as a whole society where everyone counts.
As a great Persian philosopher, poet (I forgot his name) once wrote: (my humble translation, please forgive): when one finger of one hand had been damaged the whole body is affected…
If one exists then the precise definition of what constitutes a god is also an endless discussion. We have proof that an Earthly god only exists as a destructive one and is no longer a physical productive one. On the spiritual creator side one does exist but its influences are few and it’s efforts are directed mostly at the top of the food chain.
Together along with a few common humans, they hope to build an everlasting peace but to date their is no proof that one has yet to exist in the universe, as the human is a rather fragile being and better at breaking its inner self than trying to break say a god, or the devil, or even satan himself.
This is a long and painful process that tests and stresses the human being beyond the point of imagination.
And its all by physical design as the humans came from somewhere, and deep inside, a part of them still strives to return there, or die trying not to and going to far in the opposite direction which is the open door to hell.
Xi Jinping may not want to retreat, but what about his successor? What if Xi Jinping is 21st century’s Yong Le – and what if is to be succeed by another Zhu Gaozhi?
@Dimitris A,
After what the US is going to try to do to China and President Xi’s reign in power, to contain, to destabilize, to demonize, to disrupt, to break away pieces of China, to coerce trading partners to break the global supply chain, to deny China market access, to stop Chinese investments in other nations, to mobilize an Indo-Pacific alliance to cut the sea lanes, to obstruct China’s use of the Arctic Northern Sea Route, to foment riots in Hong Kong, to incentivize Taiwan to separate from the geopolitical unity with the Mainland there will be no possible successor who might want to change China’s global role. And the Chinese people would never want to accept that fate.
China would only change its policies and goals if it lost Russia as an ally.
Succeeded by another Zhu Gaozhi? He won’t ever get into the line of succession given China’s strict meritocracy.
Neither would someone like Trump, George W. Bush or even Obama. Maybe Bill Clinton. But his womanising/philandering would have been noticed and be either straightened out or he gets the boot.
From the description in this article, Diocletian could be perceived as a Christian emperor, whereas he started the 10th antichristian persecution, which was the cruellest and most widespread, to the extent that it came close to wiping out Christianity. See, for instance https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05007b.htm.