Chinese Military,Political and Social Superthread

[Rifleman62]

ERC:

We need to build a new trans-mountain pipeline and a modern oil port on the Pacific coast to export processed oil sands petroleum to Asia - not only China. This will give us 'clout' with both China and the USA.

An earlier post suggested that your write policy for the CPC. May be that should be Canada no matter who is the government.

The key here is processed oil exports. I believe Canada and/or Liberal BC is bragging about increased lumber exports to China, but my understanding is we are exporting logs (a lot cheaper, less jobs for Canada) to be processed in China, vice lumber.

Additionally the Liberals and the NDP want to ban all oil tankers from the West coast (but not the east coast).

Where will the money come from if Obama puts pressure on US oil companys?

If it is Chinese money, what %?

 

[MarkOttawa]

Hardline view in Wall St. Journal:

Shore Up America's Air Superiority
China's military modernization means the U.S. and its allies need to take countermeasures.
http://www.google.ca/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%22Regaining+American+air+superiority+in+East+Asia+is+absolutely+essential%22+site:wsj.com

...
For the first time since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. and its allies face a competitor that can call into question what has been the American military's ace-in-the-hole—its supremacy in the skies. The test of a fifth generation fighter is not the only reason for this change in the regional balance of power. There are numerous contributing factors.

First, over the past 20 years, China has continually upgraded its air defense system. It has done in good measure by buying Russian-made S-300s. This family of surface-to-air radars and missiles is regarded as being among the world's most effective regional air defence systems, comparable and in certain respects superior in performance to the U.S.-made Patriot. With S-300s deployed across from Taiwan, the Chinese can put at risk any non-stealthy, U.S. aircraft flying in the vicinity of the Taiwan Strait. Since the vast bulk of American fighters and all U.S. tankers and transport aircraft are not stealthy, this is a serious problem.

The second problem is China's expansive deployment of medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles...

So what's to be done? Perhaps the worst thing the U.S. can do is implicitly concede this advantage to the Chinese military by implementing strategies that would stage and deploy most American military assets from bases outside the region. Creating a Fortress Guam in response, for example, will undermine the credibility of American security ties with Japan, South Korea and the Philippines. It will be next to impossible to assure our partners that "we have their backs" when we are 1,500 miles away.

At a minimum, the U.S. needs to work with its partners and allies to begin hardening existing bases and establish new bases throughout the region to complicate China's military plans. Next, given the growing threat posed by Chinese submarine developments, the U.S. will need to expand its own submarine fleet, increase resources for the Navy's anti-submarine warfare program, and move ahead with developing a new generation of airborne electronic warfare platforms that can foul and confuse enemy radars and sensor systems.

Equally urgent is getting allies like Japan and South Korea to upgrade their air fleets with stealthy aircraft. No one knows just how stealthy the new Chinese plane is or exactly when full-scale production might occur. That said, the plane will almost surely be equal to or better than the vast majority of fighters now in U.S. allies' air forces.

Accordingly, the Pentagon should be working with the Japanese and South Koreans for them to procure the F-35 stealth fighter-bomber. [US is working on this with Japanese:
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/39415/post-1010374.html#msg1010374 ]
And precisely because of the threat to air bases posed by China's ballistic and cruise missiles, it is even more incumbent that the VSTOL version of the F-35 go forward, despite current problems in the program. Having a capacity to take off and land vertically and on short runways will become even more essential in the years ahead.

Finally, Congress needs to reverse the administration's decision on ending production of the F-22 at 187. Not only is the stealthy "Raptor" far and away the finest fighter in the world—and will remain so for many years to come—it is the only plane available for more than a decade that can operate night and day in an independent fashion in a hostile Chinese air defense environment...

Mr. Schmitt is director of the American Enterprise Institute's Program on Advanced Strategic Studies and Mr. Donnelly is director of its Center for Defense Studies.

For a more realistic view of likely US military budgeting see this AW&ST editorial:

Get Real on National Security
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=defense&id=news/awst/2011/01/17/AW_01_17_2011_p50-281941.xml

Mark
Ottawa

 

[a_majoor]

I wonder if the USAF needs to leap past incremental improvements, since unless they can start producing fighters at the Willow run factory at the rate of one every 24hr (and the pilots and aircrew to man them), they will be on the wrong end of the numbers curve.

How they can sidestep the Chinese advantages in position and numbers is an interesting question, and I am sure there are any number of defense contractors willing to step up with an answer.

 

[MarkOttawa]

Realism from Robert J. Samuelson:

China's new world order demands stronger U.S. response
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/23/AR2011012302895_pf.html

By all appearances, Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit to Washington last week changed little in the lopsided American-Chinese relationship. What we have is a system that methodically transfers American jobs, technology and financial power to China in return for only modest Chinese support for important U.S. geopolitical goals: the suppression of Iran's and North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. American officials act as though there's not much they can do to change this.

It's true that the United States and China have huge common interests in peace and prosperity. Two-way trade (now about $500 billion annually) can provide low-cost consumer goods to Americans and foodstuffs and advanced manufactured products to the Chinese. But China's and America's goals differ radically. The United States wants to broaden the post-World War II international order based on mutually advantageous trade. By contrast, China pursues a new global order in which its needs come first - one in which it subsidizes exports, controls essential imports (oil, food, minerals) and compels the transfer of advanced technology.

Naturally, the United States opposes this sort of system, but that's where we're headed. Clashing goals have trumped shared interests...

...consider technology transfer. Big multinational firms want to be in China, but the cost of doing so is often the loss of important technology through required licensing agreements, mandatory joint ventures, reverse engineering or outright theft. American software companies estimate that 85 to 90 percent of their products in China are pirated.

Writing in the Harvard Business Review,
http://hbr.org/2010/12/china-vs-the-world/ar/1#
Thomas Hout and Pankaj Ghemawat cite China's high-speed-rail projects. Initially, foreign firms such as Germany's Siemens got most contracts; in 2009, the government began requiring foreign firms to enter into minority joint ventures with Chinese companies. Having mastered the "core technologies," Chinese companies have captured 80 percent or more of the local market and compete with foreign firms for exports. The same thing is occurring in commercial aircraft. China is building a competitor to the Boeing 737 and the Airbus 320; General Electric has entered into a joint venture that will supply the avionics, the electronics that guide the aircraft...

It's important to make several qualifications. First, Americans shouldn't blame China for all our economic problems, which are mostly homegrown. Indeed, the ferocity of the financial crisis discredited U.S. economic leadership and emboldened China to pursue its narrow interests more aggressively than ever. Second, the point should not be (as the Chinese allege) to "contain" China's growth; the point should be to modify its economic strategy, which is predatory. It comes at others' expense.

The U.S. response has been mostly carrots - to pretend that sweet reason will persuade China to alter its policies. Last week, President Obama and Hu exchanged largely meaningless pledges of "cooperation." Alan Tonelson of the U.S. Business and Industry Council, a group of manufacturers, says U.S. policy verges on "appeasement." We need sticks. The practical difficulty is being tougher without triggering a trade war that weakens the global recovery. Still, it's possible to do something. The Treasury could brand China a currency manipulator, which it clearly is. The administration could move more forcefully against Chinese subsidies. America's present passivity encourages China's new world order, with fateful consequences for the United States and everyone else.

Mark
Ottawa

 

 

[Edward Campbell]

The CDA missed the only important Canada/China story: the one about oil and, more broadly, resources from the former to the latter. We need to build a new trans-mountain pipeline and a modern oil port on the Pacific coast to export processed oil sands petroleum to Asia - not only China. This will give us 'clout' with both China and the USA.

----------
P.S. The NAFTA does NOT give the USA any sort of control over Canadian oil. A handful of scaremongers convince an ignorant media to repeat that lie on a semi-annual basis but it remains a lie. See here

There is new competition for the pipeline/petro-port proposals from CN Rail. It, competition, is all good, but the more processing we can do here, in Canada, using Canadian labour, the better. The Chinese, of course, would like to do as much processing as possible - costs being equal - in China, using Chinese labour.

 

[a_majoor]

More on the Chinese Stealth prototype:

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/01/was-chinas-stealth-tech-made-in-america/

Was China’s Stealth Tech Made in America?
By David Axe  January 24, 2011  |  12:01 am  |  Categories: China

On March 27, 1999, during the height of NATO’s air war on Serbia, a very smart and very lucky Serbian air-defense commander achieved the seemingly impossible. Firing three 1960s-vintage SA-3 missiles, Col. Zoltan Dani managed to shoot down an attacking U.S. Air Force F-117 stealth fighter-bomber piloted by Lt. Col. Dale Zelko. NATO commanders had been sending the alliance’s planes, including the stealth attackers, into Serbia along predictable routes, allowing Dani to carefully plan his missile ambush.

A fast-acting team of Air Force A-10 attack planes and helicopters retrieved Zelko intact, but not so the wreckage of the colonel’s top-secret jet, one of the technological stars of the 1991 Gulf War. The destroyed F-117’s left wing, canopy and ejection seat — plus Zelko’s helmet — wound up in a Belgrade aviation museum, but most of the rest of the 15-ton jet was gathered up by farmers living around the crash site.

Twelve years later, some of those components may have finally surfaced — in the design of China’s new J-20 stealth fighter.

If true, and that’s a huge “if,” the partly American origin of China’s first radar-evading warplane could be both a damning indictment of the Pentagon’s reliance on easily copied high technology, and a potential comfort to U.S. military planners desperately trying to assess the J-20’s impact on Pacific war plans.

The J-20 appeared without warning in late December and flew for the first time this month. For weeks, observers from all over the world have debated the J-20’s significance. Some are calling it the death-knell for 50 years of U.S. air dominance. Others dismiss it as a visually impressive but militarily useless piece of showmanship.

The truth is probably somewhere between those extremes, especially if the J-20 has F-117 DNA.

Back in March 1999, the F-117’s wreckage was possibly still cooling when foreign agents sprang into action. “At the time, our intelligence reports told of Chinese agents crisscrossing the region where the F-117 disintegrated, buying up parts of the plane from local farmers,” Adm. Davor Domazet-Loso, then the top Croatian officer, told the Associated Press.

“The destroyed F-117 topped that wishlist for both the Russians and Chinese,” added Zoran Kusovac, a military consultant based in Rome.

Although both are optimized for bombing, the sleek J-20 doesn’t even remotely resemble the ungainly F-117. In overall shape, the J-20 is most similar to the mid-1990s-vintage Russian MiG 1.44 prototype and Lockheed Martin’s Joint Advanced Strike Technology concept from roughly the same period.

Even so, the J-20 doesn’t necessarily mimic the MiG 1.44, JAST or any other plane, either. Granted, Beijing does have a reputation for copying foreign weapons, often badly. But China also has a growing number of its own weapons designs. And besides, the principles of aerodynamics and radar-deflection know no political borders.

As long as Chinese engineers understand the basics of what makes a plane fly and hides it from radar, it should come as no surprise that the J-20 looks a lot like other stealthy jets.

That said, when it comes to aerial stealthiness, shaping is just part of the equation. A plane’s materials — particularly any skin coatings — are equally important. That’s where China might have really benefited from studying the crashed F-117.

It’s possible the U.S. defense establishment knew that China had cracked the F-117’s secrets. Perhaps accepting that the cat was out of the bag, the Americans reportedly made no effort to retrieve the stealth artifacts from that Belgrade museum. “A lot of delegations visited us in the past, including the Chinese, Russians and Americans … but no one showed any interest in taking any part of the jet,” Zoran Milicevic, deputy director of the museum, told the AP.

And in a move that surprised many observers, in 2008 the Air Force formally retired the entire F-117 fleet, then roughly 40 strong. (A few F-117s are secretly still flying, apparently for tests.) Officially, the F-117 was obsolete. “I mean it’s a 30-year-old concept now,” F-117 pilot Lt. Col. Chris Knehans said, ignoring the fact that almost all U.S. combat aircraft designs are at least that old.

It could be that the F-117 had to go because every potential rival knew its secrets.

It’s almost certainly true that the more recent B-2 bomber, F-22 and F-35 fighters and a whole host of known and rumored stealthy drones are made of newer, better materials than the F-117 and are therefore less visible to radar. If the J-20 is based on the F-117 in any way, then the J-20 probably has stealth qualities a full generation behind current American designs — to say nothing of the next generation, including the forthcoming “B-3 bomber.”

Still, it should be discouraging to U.S. war planners that the loss of a single high-tech fighter can possibly render useless that fighter’s entire design.
What happens when the first B-2, F-22 or F-35 crashes in enemy territory?

 

[tingbudong]

ERC:
An earlier post suggested that your write policy for the CPC. May be that should be Canada no matter who is the government.

The key here is processed oil exports. I believe Canada and/or Liberal BC is bragging about increased lumber exports to China, but my understanding is we are exporting logs (a lot cheaper, less jobs for Canada) to be processed in China, vice lumber.

Additionally the Liberals and the NDP want to ban all oil tankers from the West coast (but not the east coast).

Where will the money come from if Obama puts pressure on US oil companys?

If it is Chinese money, what %?

I have some past experience in the BC forest industry and still latently follow the industry.

BC, and the North (in particular) are  blindingly drunk on China right now.  Almost every B and C list politician has made multiple trips (with more always in the pipeline) to the Mainland in search of 'opportunities' and the increase in lumber and resource exports is touted as the solution to just about every problem faced in Northern British Columbia.  Apparently they like it over there.  I recall a few months ago the head of CSIS got quite the lashing when he hinted that numerous Canadian municipal and provincial politicians were under the influence of Chinese intelligence.  I just chucked to myself. 

Like Rifleman noted, not only is exported lumber low grade, but the government often places a dollar figure on the exports rather than break down the gains by forest product.  This conveniently hides the dirty secret that much of the export increase is raw logs.

China is keenly interested in Canadian logs given that the Russian forest industry has a rather hefty (80%, apparently) tariff on timber and lumber exports.  The Russians are using the tariff to buy time to retool, and reinvest in their aging mill infrastructure.  Much of venture capital being used is from China.  I haven't read anything (or have heard through conversation) indicating that BC forest companies have any strategies in place to combat the pending rebooted Russian forest industry.   

The CCP enjoys the ability to be able to think long term.  BC politicians are are not likely to think further than four years ahead (in a good term).

 

[a_majoor]

Talk about urban sprawl:

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/01/china-to-create-largest-mega-city-in.html

China to create largest mega city in the world with 42 million people by 2017

UK Telegraph - China is planning to create the world's biggest mega city by merging nine cities to create a metropolis twice the size of Wales with a population of 42 million.

The "Turn The Pearl River Delta Into One" scheme will create a 16,000 sq mile urban area that is 26 times larger geographically than Greater London, or twice the size of Wales. The new mega-city will cover a large part of China's manufacturing heartland, stretching from Guangzhou to Shenzhen and including Foshan, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Zhuhai, Jiangmen, Huizhou and Zhaoqing. Together, they account for nearly a tenth of the Chinese economy.

Over the next six years, around 150 major infrastructure projects will mesh the transport, energy, water and telecommunications networks of the nine cities together, at a cost of some 2 trillion yuan (US$310 billion). A high speed rail line will also connect the hub with nearby Hong Kong.

Megacities at wikipedia Greater Tokyo has about 35 million people.

1 Tokyo Japan                34,200,000  incl. Yokohama, Kawasaki, Saitama
2 Guangzhou China      24,900,000  Northern Pearl River Delta incl. Dongguan, Foshan, Jiangmen, Zhongshan (4% annual growth)
3 Seoul Korea (South)  24,500,000  incl. Bucheon, Goyang, Incheon, Seongnam, Suweon
4 Delhi India                  23,900,000  incl. Faridabad, Ghaziabad (4.6% annual growth)
5 Mumbai India            23,300,000  incl. Bhiwandi, Kalyan, Thane, Ulhasnagar (2.90% annual growth)
6 Mexico City                22,800,000  incl. Nezahualcóyotl, Ecatepec, Naucalpan (2.00% annual growth)
7 New York USA            22,200,000  incl. Newark, Paterson
8 São Paulo Brazil        20,800,000  incl. Guarulhos
9 Manila Philippines      20,100,000  incl. Kalookan, Quezon City
10 Shanghai China      18,800,000


    Residents would be able to use universal rail cards and buy annual tickets to allow them to commute around the mega-city.

    Twenty-nine rail lines, totaling 3,100 miles, will be added, cutting rail journeys around the urban area to a maximum of one hour between different city centres. According to planners, phone bills could also fall by 85 per cent and hospitals and schools will be improved.

    By the end of the decade, China plans to move ever greater numbers into its cities, creating some city zones with 50 million to 100 million people and "small" city clusters of 10 million to 25 million.

    In the north, the area around Beijing and Tianjin, two of China's most important cities, is being ringed with a network of high-speed railways that will create a super-urban area known as the Bohai Economic Rim. Its population could be as high as 260 million.

    The process of merging the Bohai region has already begun with the connection of Beijing to Tianjing by a high speed railway that completes the 75 mile journey in less than half an hour, providing an axis around which to create a network of feeder cities.

    As the process gathers pace, total investment in urban infrastructure over the next five years is expected to hit £685 billion, according to an estimate by the British Chamber of Commerce, with an additional £300 billion spend on high speed rail and £70 billion on urban transport.

There is no name for the city. Mega-City One (from Judge Dredd) seems appropriate

Several more supermegacities seem likely to be formed.

 

[CougarKing]

I have some past experience in the BC forest industry and still latently follow the industry.

BC, and the North (in particular) are  blindingly drunk on China right now.  Almost every B and C list politician has made multiple trips (with more always in the pipeline) to the Mainland in search of 'opportunities' and the increase in lumber and resource exports is touted as the solution to just about every problem faced in Northern British Columbia.  Apparently they like it over there.  I recall a few months ago the head of CSIS got quite the lashing when he hinted that numerous Canadian municipal and provincial politicians were under the influence of Chinese intelligence.  I just chucked to myself. 

Tingbudong/聽不懂!!! welcome back. Ni hai ting bu dong ma? Ni yi jing ting DE/得 dong ma?  ;D


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile...in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of China...

link

Tiananmen activist accuses HK of bowing to China

A leader of the 1989 Tiananmen protests Wednesday accused Hong Kong of bowing to pressure from China after he was barred from entering the city to attend the memorial of a pro-democracy icon.

Activist Wang Dan, who now lives in Taiwan, had applied to enter Hong Kong following the death earlier this month of Szeto Wah, who died of cancer at the age of 79. His memorial service this weekend is expected to draw thousands.

The one-time Hong Kong legislator had helped many dissidents flee China after the bloody crackdown on Beijing pro-democracy protests which saw hundreds, if not thousands, killed.
Hong Kong, a former British colony, has maintained a semi-autonomous status since its return to China in 1997 with a separate legal system and civil liberties not seen in mainland China.

But on Wednesday, Wang joined a growing chorus of criticism which has accused Hong Kong of keeping out visitors deemed unwelcome by Beijing.
"The Hong Kong government has given up the rights to self-rule," Wang said in a statement posted on his website.

"This incident proves that the 'One Country, Two systems' is a lie," he added, referring to a post-colonial agreement to let Hong Kong run its own affairs.
"One cannot rely on authorities to protect Hong Kong's freedom and democracy".

In a telephone interview with AFP, Wang said: "I am angry and upset that my visa was refused and this shows the Beijing government's lack of confidence in itself".

He is scheduled to hold a news conference in Taipei on Thursday along with Wu'er Kaixi, another former student leader now in Taiwan, who had also asked Hong Kong immigration to let him attend Szeto's memorial.

Wu'er told AFP that he "still holds out hope to be able to pay last respects to Uncle Wah".

Szeto was best known for founding the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, which routinely criticised Beijing for human-rights abuses and pushed for political reforms in Hong Kong.

Earlier this month, Wang posted entries on his Facebook and Twitter pages, promising not to hold news conferences or participate in any public events if he was allowed to enter Hong Kong, adding that the government would be "inhumane" to refuse his bid.

"We sincerely hope they can make a last effort (to allow him to come)," union legislator Lee Cheuk-yan told local television Wednesday.

"Him coming would be a good thing."
...

 

[a_majoor]

More "Smart Diplomacy". It seems clear the administration (and several past ones) have no idea what they are dealing with:

http://www.american.com/archive/2011/january/a-state-insult-with-chinese-characteristics

A State Insult with Chinese Characteristics
By Nicholas Eberstadt
Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Filed under: World Watch, Culture, Government & Politics, Public Square

A state banquet was scene to a triumph of sorts for a newly assertive, and more nakedly anti-American, strain in Chinese foreign policy.

How to evaluate the results of last week’s China-U.S. summit in Washington? Improbably, the key for the entire event may lie in what is usually the least memorable portion of these carefully choreographed occasions: the cultural program at the concluding state banquet.

During the dinner’s musical interlude and following a duet with American jazz musician Herbie Hancock, Chinese pianist Lang Lang treated the assembled dignitaries to a solo of what he described as “a Chinese song: ‘My Motherland.’” (You can watch this on YouTube.)

The Chinese delegation was clearly delighted: Chinese President and Communist Party chief Hu Jintao, stone-faced for many of his other photo ops in Washington, beamed with pleasure upon hearing the melody and embraced Lang Lang at the song’s conclusion (see it on YouTube too). President Obama, for his part, amiably praised Lang Lang for his performance and described the event as "an extraordinary evening."

‘My Motherland’ is still famous in China; indeed, it is well-known to practically every Chinese adult to this very day.But what, exactly, is this “gorgeous” and “beautiful” (Hu’s words) tune that so entranced China’s visiting leadership?

“My Motherland” is not a “Chinese song” in any ordinary meaning of the term. Instead, it is a Mao-era propaganda classic: the theme from "Triangle Hill" (Shangganling), a film in which heroic Chinese forces fight, kill, and eventually beat Americans in pitched battle during the Korean War.

“My Motherland” epitomizes the “Resist America, Aid [North] Korea” campaign that Beijing embraced during and after the Korean War. It celebrates Sino-American enmity. The gist of the tune can be seen in its lyrics (see the Wikipedia translation):

When friends are here, there is fine wine
But if the wolves come
What greets it is the hunting gun.

(Two guesses who “the wolves” are.)

“My Motherland” is still famous in China; indeed, it is well-known to practically every Chinese adult to this very day. Unfortunately, this political anthem and its significance were evidently unknown to the many members of the administration’s China team—the secretary and deputy secretary of State, the assistant secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific, and the National Security Council’s top two Asia experts—who were on hand at the state dinner and heard this serenade. Clueless about the nature of the insult, they did not know to warn the president that he would embarrass himself and his country by not only sitting through the song, but by congratulating Lang Lang for it afterward.

Unfortunately, this political anthem and its significance were evidently completely unknown to the many members of the Obama administration’s China team.Although Americans are often tone-deaf to cadences of symbolism in international relations, the Chinese are not. And for Chinese audiences, the symbolism of performing “My Motherland” to a host of uncomprehending barbarians in the White House itself hardly required explanation. This was a triumph of sorts for a newly assertive, and more nakedly anti-American, strain in Chinese foreign policy. The episode has reportedly already gone viral over the Chinese Internet, where the buzz on this crude and deliberate snub is overwhelmingly and enthusiastically positive. Hu can thus return home confident his visit to America will widely be regarded as a success domestically— for reasons his American counterparts do not yet seem to comprehend.

The “My Motherland” incident, for its part, may only be a foretaste of what lies ahead in U.S.-China relations. Note, for example, this week’s New York Times front-page story “China Grooming Deft Politician as Next Leader,” announcing Xi Jinping, the Chinese vice president and politburo member, as heir presumptive to Hu Jintao. Xi is lauded as “a brilliant politician” who “came to hate ideological struggles” and is known for “his conciliatory leadership style.” This is the same urbane pragmatist who delivered a speech in Beijing last October commemorating China’s role in the Korean War, a war Xi described as “imposed by the imperialist aggressors,” while Chinese and North Korean troops were waging “a war of justice to defend peace.” Xi even trotted out the long-discredited Communist lie that Americans used germ warfare in the Korean conflict.

This Orwellian rendition of the origins and conduct of the Korean War augurs ill for U.S.-China relations on many counts (not the least of these being the prospect of cooperation on denuclearization in North Korea—in Xi’s telling, the supposed victim of a U.S. surprise attack in 1950). Xi's diatribe reveals a lingering and deep-seated animosity toward the United States, and suggests that China’s rising generation of rulers will be less shy about advertising (and perhaps acting upon) such sentiments than their predecessors.

If American policy makers are to avoid unpleasant surprises in their dealings with China in the years ahead, they must pay far more attention to official Chinese pronouncements, commentary, and doctrine. All too often, American security specialists—and even China watchers—are inclined to disregard official Chinese speechifying as so much boring palaver. The problem is that in a controlled society, official words matter. Sometimes, even songs do.

Nicholas Eberstadt holds the Henry Wendt Chair in Political Economy at the American Enterprise Institute.

FURTHER READING: Michael Mazza notes Chinese expansionism in “China and the Lost Pearls,” while Eberstadt discusses “A Poverty of Statistics.” Eberstadt also considers “Global Poverty and Its Sad Persistence,” says it is “Time for Demographic ‘Stress Tests,’” and outlines “Asia-Pacific Demographics in 2010-2040.”

 

[a_majoor]

How solid is the foundation of China's economic and military might?

http://www.cnbc.com/id/41343440

Inflation Slowing China's Export Engine

Published: Sunday, 30 Jan 2011 | 10:46 PM ET
By: Keith Bradsher
 
Inflation is starting to slow China’s mighty export machine, as buyers from Western multinational companies balk at higher prices and have cut back their planned spring shipments across the Pacific.

Markups of 20 to 50 percent on products like leather shoes and polo shirts have sent Western buyers scrambling for alternate suppliers. But from Vietnam to India, few low-wage developing countries can match China’s manufacturing might — and no country offers refuge from high global commodity prices.

Already, the slowdown in American orders has forced some container shipping lines to cancel up to a quarter of their trips to the United States this spring from Hong Kong and other Chinese ports.

The trend, if continued, could ease tensions by beginning to limit America’s huge trade deficit with China. Those tensions were an undercurrent during Chinese President Hu Jintao’s recent Washington talks with President Obama.

Manufacturers and distributors across a range of industries say the likely result of the export slowdown is higher prices for American shoppers in the coming months, and possibly brief shortages of some products if Western retailers delay purchases too long while haggling over prices.

China exports more than $4 of goods to the United States for each $1 it imports from America, creating a trade surplus of about $275 billion. The higher Chinese prices will tend to show up mainly in products like inexpensive clothing and other commodity goods in which labor and raw materials represent a bigger part of the final value — rather than in sophisticated electronics like Apple iPads, in which Chinese assembly is only a small fraction of the cost.

Of course, the slowdown in the volume of imports could also prove temporary, if American consumers accept higher prices and Western corporate buyers end up renewing contracts at much higher cost. In the meantime, if the average price for each imported product rises faster than the volume of shipments falls, China’s surplus with the United States could continue increasing temporarily.

But whatever the eventual impact on trade, Chinese inflation might also reduce Washington’s pressure on Beijing over its currency, the renminbi. For more than a year, the Obama administration has been pushing China to let the renminbi rise in value against the dollar.

China’s intervention in the currency market has kept its currency artificially low. But that flood of money has also driven inflation, giving Beijing an incentive to let the renminbi move higher. Indeed, the renminbi has increased 3.6 percent against the dollar since last June.

The Obama administration is starting to suggest that the currency problem could gradually solve itself if Chinese prices rise so fast that American goods become more competitive.

The first signs of a potential slowdown in Chinese exports have shown up in shipping. As factories closed on Friday across much of China in preparation for weeklong Chinese New Year celebrations, ports in Hong Kong and elsewhere along the coast were working long hours to meet last-minute shipments.

But the annual pre-New Year rush has been nothing like that of recent years, causing shipping lines to reverse rate increases and cancel sailings they introduced last summer as the American economy improved. This winter, the scurrying started only two weeks before the holidays, instead of the usual four weeks, according to shipping executives. That is because many Chinese factories simply cut back production this month as their Western customers began resisting steep price increases.

China’s inflation is running 5 percent at the consumer level, according to official measures. But Chinese and Western economists describe these measures as based on flawed, outdated techniques and say the real figure may be up to twice as high.

In contrast, the annual inflation rate in the United States is low by historical standards — about 1.5 percent currently.

China imposed price controls on food in mid-November to limit inflation. But Chinese state media began warning the public on Wednesday that those controls might be ineffective, as a drought in northern China has damaged the winter wheat crop and frost has spoiled part of the vegetable harvest in the south.

China’s $6 trillion economy used to be heavily dependent on exports for growth. Exports still account for about one-fifth of the economy, after excluding goods that are merely imported to China for final assembly and then re-exported. But China’s economy has grown powerfully for the last two years mainly on the strength of investment-led domestic demand. That demand, partly fed by low-interest lending by state-owned banks, is another factor in China’s inflation.

Cities and provinces across China have tried to cushion inflation’s effect on consumers by sharply raising minimum wages. Guangdong Province, the export heartland of light industry next to Hong Kong, announced two weeks ago that its cities were raising their minimum wages by an average of 18.6 percent, effective March 1.

That follows a similar increase that took effect in Guangdong around eight months ago. Many other provinces and cities have also sharply raised minimum wages recently.

The wage increases are also driven by a growing scarcity of factory workers. The number of Chinese in their 20s and early 30s, the traditional age bracket for factory labor, is slowly shrinking because of the introduction of the “one child system” a generation ago. And a rapidly expanding university system has produced waves of graduates with no interest in factory work.

Some companies have responded by moving factories deeper into China’s interior, said Stanley Lau, the deputy chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries, which represents exporters employing 10 million mainland Chinese workers. But inland wages are starting to catch up with coastal pay rates, Mr. Lau said, while higher transportation costs frequently offset the wage savings from moving to the interior.

Coach, the American company that is one of the largest marketers of luxury handbags and other accessories, announced on Tuesday that it planned to reduce its reliance on China to less than half of its products, from more than 80 percent now. It will shift output to Vietnam and India, particularly for smaller, more labor-intensive leather goods.

But Mike Devine, the company’s executive vice president and chief financial officer, said that it would take four years to carry out the shift.

Trying to move production elsewhere, some retailers are finding many factories are already fully booked: Vietnam and Thailand each have populations smaller than some Chinese provinces, while Cambodia and Laos have smaller populations than some Chinese cities.

Many manufacturers foresee further labor shortages looming in China that will push wages even higher. They are responding with plans to upgrade their factory equipment and product designs, which could turn them into more direct competitors with high-end manufacturers in Europe and the United States.

- Hilda Wang contributed reporting.
This story originally appeared in the The New York Times

 

[CougarKing]

Seems the ex-Russian/Ukrainian carrier VARYAG (soon to be renamed SHI LANG/施琅) is closer to completion:

Report: Aircraft carrier nearly restored

link

China has completed the major steps required to fully restore a partially built aircraft carrier purchased from Ukraine in 1998, the Hong Kong-based Kanwa Asian Defense magazine said in a report Wednesday.

The aircraft carrier, Varyag, is being worked on at a shipyard in Dalian, Liaoning Province. All the living and work compartments, engines, navigation systems and power-generating equipment were restored, the report said.

Military sources said that many foreign media reports about China's plan to build an aircraft carrier are based on satellite images, and those reports may not be completely wrong.

Li Jie, a researcher at the Naval Research Institute in the PLA navy, told the Global Times that the visible parts of the aircraft carrier, such as the radar system and the communication equipment, could be seen by a satellite.

"The construction of an aircraft carrier always follows a certain procedure, so the completion time could be deduced from the visible parts on the deck," Li added.

"In 2009, China put forward a plan and a program for building an aircraft carrier," according to China's Ocean Development Report (2010), a book published in May by the State Oceanic Administration, which is under the Ministry of Land and Resources.

"This shows that China has started entering a new historic era of comprehensively building itself into a great naval power," the report said.

China apparently purchased Russian SU-33 carrier-based fighters and has modified domestic J-11 jets for carrier landings and takeoffs, according to the Associated Press.

Reuters reported last month, citing an anonymous source, that China could put the carrier into use around July 1 this year, when it plans to celebrate the CPC's 90th birthday. It would be one year ahead of US analysts' expectations.

Jeff Head link: please scroll down at this link for the latest pics of the VARYAG/SHI LANG superstructure

2011 picture from above link, with superstructure returned to hull:

 

[a_majoor]

The conflict between science and the "narrative". In North America, the "Kennewick Man" is persona non grata since he also represents a Caucasian group who apparently settled in North America before the ancestors of the current Aborigional peoples arrived, upending the narrative of who was here first. Outside of the political dust-up, the movement of ancient peoples is a very interesting subject:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/mystery-of-the-mummys-chinese-travel-ban-2205033.html#

Mystery of the mummy's Chinese travel ban
By Clifford Coonan in Beijing

Saturday, 5 February 2011

The 'Beauty of Xiaohe', which China has pulled out of an exhibition in the US

For her advanced years, she looks remarkable. Despite nearing the ripe old age of 4,000, long eyelashes still frame her half-open eyes and hair tumbles down to her remarkably well-preserved shoulders.

But the opportunity for new audiences in the United States to view the "Beauty of Xiaohe" – a near perfectly preserved mummy from an inhospitable part of western China – has been dealt a blow after it was pulled from an exhibition following a sudden call from the Chinese authorities on the eve of opening. The reason for pulling the mummy and other artefacts from the show remained unclear yesterday (Chinese officials were on New Year holiday) but there were suggestions that the realities of modern Chinese politics may have had a part to play.

The mummy was recovered from China's Tarim Basin, in Xinjiang province. But her Caucasian features raised the prospect that the region's inhabitants were European settlers.

It raises the question about who first settled in Xinjiang and for how long the oil-rich region has been part of China. The questions are important – most notably for the Chinese authorities who face an intermittent separatist movement of nationalist Uighurs, a Turkic-speaking Muslim people who number nine million in Xinjiang.

The government-approved story of China's first contact with the West dates back to 200BC when China's emperor Wu Di wanted to establish an alliance with the West against the marauding Huns, then based in Mongolia. However, the discovery of the mummies suggests that Caucasians were settled in a part of China thousands of years before Wu Di: the notion that they arrived in Xinjiang before the first East Asians is truly explosive.

Xinjiang is dominated by the Uighurs, who resent what they see as intrusion by the Han Chinese. The tensions which have spilled over into violent clashes in recent years.

Whatever the reason for the Chinese decision, it has caused great disappointment at the Pennsylvania museum where the "Secrets of the Silk Road" were due to go on show after successful exhibitions in California and Texas without major reproductions.

"It's going to be the rebirth of this museum," Victor Mair, a professor of Chinese language and literature, told the Associated Press last month. "It's going to put it back on the map."

Professor Mair declined to comment on the current controversy.

 

[tingbudong]

It will be interesting to see what direction the PLAN and the CCP go with the Shi Lang and it's successors.  I've always been of the opinion that the rush to get this duck in the tub was largely done to placate PLAN morale and middle class nationalism rather than push around folks in the South China Sea.  Such platforms are often viewed as offensive power projection which doesn't help the image of the much vaunted soft power initiatives of the past 15 years.  They'll drive it up and down the coast, show it off to a proud nation, anchor it in Hainan.     

On the other hand, 2010 turned out to be a rather unflattering year for China in relations with its neighbours.  Expanding a minor fishing boat incident  into a unofficial trade war (I was seriously surprised there wasn't a repeat of the 2005 anti-Japan riots), continuing indifference regarding North Korea and quite a few embarrassing faux pas and amateurish lectures by it's diplomatic corp nudged Asia back a bit closer to the US.  China isn't as popular as it once was. 

It could be that soft power isn't going to cut it anymore (be it their own fault, or maybe it was calculated this way) and they need this bad boy (and it's siblings) out in the park batting for the home team.

It used to be very common to read in most available articles and media regarding the PLA the line that China's military build-up was for peaceful purposes only.  Pretty standard fare.  One still sees this, but not nearly as often as five or six years ago.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Please remember that Joseph Nye, the preeminent "soft power" thinker, teaches that you cannot have soft power with concomitant "hard power" - something that way too many Canadians ignore.

 

[a_majoor]

A push for greater efficiency at Chinese Universities. We could learn something from that:

http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/the_world_view/de_bureaucratization_within_china_s_universities

De-bureaucratization within China’s Universities
By Kai Jiang February 12, 2011 1:45 pm EST

Since the draft of Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-Term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020) released in February 2010 by the Ministry of Education for public discussion, de-bureaucratization within institutions of higher education (gaoxiao qu xingzhenghua) has been a hot issue of debate. Colleges and universities have been objects of fierce public criticism from scholars, students, government, and other stakeholders. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao opposed bureaucratization within higher education institutions. As he indicated, "Universities had better abolish so many complicated administrative levels."

In China, public colleges and universities are associated with different levels of political administration. For example, thirty-nine top universities ("985 project") are approved as units at the deputy ministry level of the central government; undergraduate institutions are generally affiliated as units at the department level; and tertiary vocational colleges are recognized as units at a lower administrative level. Accordingly, presidents, party secretaries, heads of administrative affairs, and deans of schools at higher education institutions are appointed by their respective administrative authorities. Their salary and treatment also reflect the corresponding stature of the administrative level that supervises them.

Presidents and party secretaries (representatives of the Community Party who usually have considerable administrative authority) of public institutions are appointed by central or provincial governments; deans of schools are nominated by their universities. More importantly, substantive academic authority is in the hands of control of presidents, party secretaries, office heads, and deans; resources are distributed by these groups. University senators and professors, especially lower status faculty members have limited impact on university governance. Their voices are barely audible. Although public opinion is critical of colleges and universities the political bureaucracy more than the academic organization hold the authority to respond. According to public opinion, bureaucratization has inhibited China's universities from educating excellent talent and achieving landmark research during the past decades. If bureaucratization within academic institutions continues, it is impossible for China to construct word-class universities and build a strong higher education system.

Of course, there are different understandings of de-bureaucratization within institutions of higher education. Zhou Qifeng, President of Peking University agrees in principle with the idea of de-bureaucratizing universities. Yet, he argues that in China's current context if the administrative levels of universities and their cadre are removed, higher education institutions will face even greater problems and challenges. He stated that at his university many academic powers, including faculty appointments are already left to the schools and university senate.

According to the final text of Outline of China’s National Plan for Medium and Long-Term Education Reform and Development (2010-2020), colleges and universities need to seek administrative systems more compatible with the characteristics of academic institutions, overcome the tendency of over-administration, and abolish the existing multi-level governance model; governments should improve governance and legally ensure that academic institutions make full use of autonomy but also “tow the mark”. It will take China time to achieve these objectives and the project will proceed step by step.

It is unfair for colleges and universities to be accused of bureaucracy. In China the all-powerful state exercises a tight rein over academic institutions—public institutions are government-affiliated and therefore have limited autonomy. The root cause of bureaucratization within colleges and universities is a result of the strong influence of an external actor—the government. As Chen Xuefei, a distinguished professor of higher education at Peking University has insightfully pointed out, "The key to de-bureaucratization within higher education institutions is in government's hand."

Note: There are different translations for "qu xingzhenghua" of "gaoxiao qu xingzhenghua" in China, including non-administration, de-administration, and de- bureaucratization et al. In fact, what the universities need to reduce is bureaucratization, while administration is a necessary activity of running a university. Therefore, de-bureaucratization is the best suitable expression for translation of "qu xingzhenghua".

(Kai Jiang is an associate professor at the Graduate School of Education, Peking University. E-mail: kjiang@pku.edu.cn.)

And a footnote from Instapundit:

In the United States, meanwhile, most of the explosive growth in higher education costs has come from administrative bloat, much of it driven by the need to comply with federal regulations.

 

[CougarKing]

A Chinatown in Northern Iraq...not surprising that another would pop up in the Middle East since you can find Chinatowns all over including as far as Africa (even in the island countries of Mauritius and Madagascar) and Latin America as well. While some previous waves of immigration occurred during the Western colonial era, or during the mass migrations after up to and after 1949, these most recent migrations from China might be more of a result of the emergent "floating population" of rural-urban migrants who were encouraged to go overseas, or those laid off from a large number of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) privatized in preceding years.

link

Northern Iraq's budding Chinatown   
As foreign investment increases in Iraqi Kurdistan, cultural boundaries are being broken.
Rhodri Davies Last Modified: 14 Feb 2011 14:38 GMT

There are several hundred Chinese in Sulaimaniyah, where traditional Kurdish life is still the norm [Rhodri Davies] 

While Ling Ling stacks hot and spicy prawn crackers and dried black beans with ginger onto the shelves of, to her, a familiar looking Chinese market, her wider surroundings of northern Iraq are more foreign.

Ling, from Anhui province in eastern China, has been managing the shop there for about six months after responding to a newspaper advertisement by a Chinese firm.

She plans to stay for a few more years to take a share of what she sees as the nascent economic potential of the northern semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan.

"I came to do business here. I think people are not very clever here. They need people to come with good idea to sell things here," Ling, 34, said.

"So I can help people here and they can help me."

The Chinese market is in the newly opened Kawa Mall in Sulaimaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan's second city. Chinese people, outlets and a restaurant dominate the top two floors, which are reserved for firms from the world's second biggest economy, of the Kurdish-owned shopping centre.

With her husband, mother and sister also in the city, Ling has felt comfortable enough to move from living among the Chinese community to living within a Kurdish one.


 
"I want some touch with Kurdi people. They have some good idea. They know what job is good, what business is good. We want to know that," she said.

The majority of the approximately 500 Chinese in Sulaimaniyah, which has a municipal population of about 750,000, work in the mall. Chinese flags, lucky cats and paper lanterns make for an incongruous sight as locals in the widely pleated trousers, flayed suit jackets and turbans of Iraqi Kurdistan pass by.

Statues of two dragons have been placed at the main entrance looking out towards the neighbouring mosque, traditional souq and street sellers.

Foreign investment is increasing in Iraqi Kurdistan. More than half of the 1,170 foreign firms investing there are Turkish, working in areas such as construction. Multinational firms are monitoring development of the area's 43.7 billion barrels of proven oil and 25.5 billion barrels of potential reserves.

Funds from abroad are also making their way into retail in an attempt to exploit the consumer potential of the 4.7 million strong local population, of which more than half are under the age of 20.

International investment surpassed $14bn from mid-2006 to September 2010, unconfirmed official sources have said.

Iraqi Kurdistan has had limited autonomy since 1991, due to a no-fly zone placed over it by international powers after attacks by Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist regime.

The region was also relatively unscathed by the subsequent war with the US that decimated the centre and south of the county. However, the proximity to Saddam's Iraq and the recent conflict has left it poor, lacking in infrastructure and skills.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is hoping the estimated 250,000 to 300,000 foreigners it has so far attracted to the region will help to enervate some of those deficiencies.

Legal aid

The passing of new immigration and investment legislation in the KRG and federally has encouraged foreign investment.

There is no initial visa requirement for visitors and businesspeople in the KRG and foreign businesses are permitted the same rights as their domestic counterparts, permitting them full ownership of properties and activities. This is in addition to entitlements to 10-year tax breaks and the freedom to repatriate all capital.

Fryad Rwandzi, a member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and a former representative in the national parliament in the capital Baghdad, said: "The local parliament adopted a law called the investment law [in July 2006] and this is attracting a lot of companies and countries to come to Kurdistan and invest.

"The law is protecting investors very well and is giving opportunities to them to invest.

"From Turkey and Iran, the Emirates, Lebanon, Egypt. Now many companies from Italy, Germany, Korea, have come to Kurdistan to invest."

Commercial air links have also proliferated to the Middle East and Europe, where many Iraqi Kurds have emigrated.

These changes have been a big move forward for Iraq which has previously known little immigration or foreign investment, not only during 21 years of Saddam's rule but previously under the country's monarchy.

Rwandzi said: "When we adopted the immigration law many politicians could not understand what is going on or why we should adopt this law.

"We said that globalisation is going on and many people come to Baghdad or other parts of Iraq and they might stay. Therefore we have to create a good ground for them to stay."

Difficult early trading

Yet, life with regular electricity blackouts and military checkpoints between towns in the KRG is not easy. Unemployment is at 14 per cent.

"People like nice things here, but they don't want to pay too much money. That is the problem," Ling said.

"Business has been okay," she added. "I think that I will stay maybe two more years."

However, other shop managers in Kawa Mall did not have such a positive take on trade there.

Andy Liu, a 31-year-old from Hunan province, said the lack of wealth in the local economy was putting his business under strain.

"Maybe after six months I will quit. Business is very bad. In one day I pay $150 for everything but I only sell $100 to $200 worth."

Additionally, working hours can be long and integration into a country without any precedent for immigration is difficult.

"We work in the morning 9.30am to 10pm. After we go home. We don't spend time with Kurdi people. Only go home, cooking, playing computer, watching TV. Very boring," Liu said.

Ling also finds little time to mix with locals.

"In China I have a lot of free time. I can do what I want. I have very nice food and shopping. But here nothing. Just work," she said, laughing.

Of those locals she interacts with, Ling said: "Some people are very good, very friendly. But some are very bad. They cheat people and steal. But I think that a lot of people are nice and very friendly. They agree with people from other countries."

Embryonic integration


There has been little immigration to northern
Iraq in the past [Rhodri Davies]
There is no office to aid legal or illegal immigrants and no government programmes to help integrate locals and foreigners.

Sareng Aziz, a lecturer in sociology at Sulaimaniyah University, said that foreigners can help to strengthen the region in the areas where it is weak, such as corruption and employee rights. She also believes they will help to promote harmonious living among different ethnicities.

"The Iraqi or Kurdish people have to learn to live in a multi-cultural society and accept other norms and values. There are many other people living with other habits, traditions, norms and values and this is very important.

"Because most people can't travel outside of the country so this is very important for them to see other cultures."

Aziz also asserts that the initiative has political implications during this period of change for the country.

"This is the first time that the doors are opening for the foreigners. Sometimes we hear about some cultural shock but I think that this is a very great opportunity for us to accept others. This is the beginning of living in a democracy. To accept the other and the difference."

In fact, northern Iraq has traditionally been home to numerous religious and cultural groups - different sects of Sunni and Shia Islam, Yazidis, Armenians, Jews and Christian Assyrians and Chaldeans - although tensions have also been present historically.

Iraqi testbed

Rwandzi said that the KRG's culture is open and lacks "the hardline parts of Islamic society".

"People in Kurdistan deal with immigrants with a very open mind and that they are part of society. Therefore, I don't think that they have any problem coming to Kurdistan and mixing," he said.

"In [the KRG capital] Erbil as well, we have restaurants, nightclubs, singers and many people."

The KRG is seen as a testbed for Iraq as a whole. Businesses are looking at options for the country's mineral wealth, abundant agricultural and construction potential, enterprising human capital and tourism.

The International Monetary Fund predicts GDP growth in Iraq to be 11.5 per cent for 2011, although at present conditions are generally considered too unsafe for widespread outlays.

Ling hopes that the investments made in the KRG will mean that her move there will be an economic success, and has enough faith in the region to give the process time.

"After maybe a few years here it will be a very strong country, it is a very nice country," she said.

"Now we need more people to come here. I think more people are coming here from China all the time.

"But I think business is better here than in China. It is good for me."

 

[a_majoor]

Edward's discussions of how the "Red Dynasty" needs to maintain legitimacy seems to be coming to fruition here. If the current government cannot satisfy the underlying demands, the protests will continue to grow in size and intensity, and either the government will have to exert greater efforts to keep the lid on or be overwhelmed....

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110220/ap_on_re_as/as_china_jasmine_revolution

China tries to stamp out 'Jasmine Revolution'           

By ANITA CHANG, Associated Press Anita Chang, Associated Press – 2 hrs 21 mins ago

BEIJING – Jittery Chinese authorities wary of any domestic dissent staged a show of force Sunday to squelch a mysterious online call for a "Jasmine Revolution," with only a handful of people joining protests apparently modeled on the pro-democracy demonstrations sweeping the Middle East.

Authorities detained activists, increased the number of police on the streets, disconnected some cell phone text messaging services and censored Internet postings about the call to stage protests in Beijing, Shanghai and 11 other major cities.

Police took at least three people away in Beijing, one of whom tried to place white jasmine flowers on a planter while hundreds of people milled about the protest gathering spot, outside a McDonald's on the capital's busiest shopping street. In Shanghai, police led away three people near the planned protest spot after they scuffled in an apparent bid to grab the attention of passers-by.

Many activists said they didn't know who was behind the campaign and weren't sure what to make of the call to protest, which first circulated Saturday on the U.S.-based Chinese-language news website Boxun.com.

The unsigned notice called for a "Jasmine Revolution" — the name given to the Tunisian protest movement — and urged people "to take responsibility for the future." Participants were urged to shout, "We want food, we want work, we want housing, we want fairness" — a slogan that highlights common complaints among Chinese.

The call is likely to fuel anxiety in China's authoritarian government, which is ever alert for domestic discontent and has appeared unnerved by protests in Egypt, Tunisia, Bahrain, Yemen, Algeria and Libya. It has limited media reports about them, stressing the instability caused by the protests, and restricted Internet searches to keep Chinese uninformed about Middle Easterners' grievances against their autocratic rulers.

Though there are many similarities between the complaints voiced by Middle East citizens and the everyday troubles of Chinese, Beijing's tight grip on the country's media, Internet and other communication forums poses difficulties for anyone trying to organize mass demonstrations.

Extensive Internet filtering and monitoring meant that most Chinese were unlikely to know about the call to protest Sunday. Boxun.com is blocked, as are Twitter and Facebook, which were instrumental in Egypt's protest movement. Tech-savvy Chinese can circumvent controls, but few of the country's Internet users seek out politically subversive content.

Anti-government gatherings in China are routinely stamped out by its pervasive security forces, which are well-funded and well-equipped. A pro-democracy movement in 1989 that directly challenged the Communist government was crushed by the military and hundreds, perhaps thousands, were killed.

On Saturday, President Hu Jintao ordered national and provincial officials to "solve prominent problems which might harm the harmony and stability of the society."

One person sitting in the McDonald's after the brief protest in Beijing said he saw Sunday's gathering as a dry run.

"Lots of people in here are Twitter users and came to watch like me," said 42-year-old Hu Di. "Actually this didn't have much organization, but it's a chance to meet each other. It's like preparing for the future."

With foot traffic always heavy at the Wangfujing pedestrian mall, it was difficult to discern who showed up to protest, who came to watch and who was out shopping. Many wondered if there was a celebrity in the area because of the heavy police presence and dozens of foreign reporters and news cameras.

As the crowd swelled and police urged people to move on, 25-year-old Liu Xiaobai placed a white jasmine flower on a planter in front of the McDonald's and took some photos with his cell phone.

"I'm quite scared because they took away my phone. I just put down some white flowers, what's wrong with that?" Liu said afterward. "I'm just a normal citizen and I just want peace."

Security agents tried to take away Liu, but he was swarmed by journalists and eventually was seen walking away with a friend.

Two other people were taken away by police, including a shabbily dressed old man who was cursing and shouting, though it wasn't clear if he was there because of the online call to protest.

In Shanghai, three young men were taken away from outside a Starbucks coffee shop in People's Square by police, who refused to answer reporters' questions about why they were detained. They trio had been shouting complaints about the government and that food prices are too high.

A couple dozen older people were drawn to the commotion and started voicing their own complaints and saying they wanted democracy and the right to vote. One woman jumped up on a roadside cement block to shout, "The government are all hooligans," then ran off, only to return a bit later and shout again at the police and others crowded in the area before once again scampering away.

Security officials were relaxed toward the retirees and the crowd eventually drifted away.

There were no reports of protests in other cities where people were urged to gather, such as Guangzhou, Tianjin, Wuhan and Chengdu.

Ahead of the planned protests, human rights groups estimated that anywhere from several dozen to more than 100 activists in cities across China were detained by police, confined to their homes or were missing. Families and friends reported the detention or harassment of several dissidents, and some activists said they were warned not to participate.

On Sunday, searches for "jasmine" were blocked on China's largest Twitter-like microblog, and status updates with the word on popular Chinese social networking site Renren.com were met with an error message and a warning to refrain from postings with "political, sensitive ... or other inappropriate content."

A text messaging service from China Mobile was unavailable in Beijing on Sunday due to an upgrade, according to a customer service operator for the leading service provider, who did not know how long the suspension would last. In the past, Chinese authorities have suspended text messaging in politically tense areas to prevent organizing.

Boxun.com said its website was attacked Saturday after it posted the call to protest. A temporary site, on which users were reporting heavy police presence in several cities, was up and running Sunday. The site said in a statement it had no way of verifying the origins of the campaign.

___

Associated Press writers Cara Anna and Charles Hutzler in Beijing and Elaine Kurtenbach in Shanghai contributed to this report.

 

[MarkOttawa]

Meanwhile across the East China Sea:

Battling US for huge deal, Eurofighter woos Japan
http://www.taiwannews.com.tw/etn/news_content.php?id=1522287&lang=eng_news

In a deal that could be worth billions of dollars and determine one of the primary fighter jets in Asia for decades to come, European aircraft makers are trying to convince Japan to do something it has never done before _ snub America.

U.S. planes have long been Tokyo's overwhelming favorite, but Japan appears to be wobbling under a strong sales pitch for the Eurofighter Typhoon, coupled with problems and restrictions that have made the American alternatives less attractive.

The stakes are high.

The contract is expected to be worth upward of $10 billion, and the chosen plane will be the showcase aircraft for Washington's chief ally in the region at a time when both China and Russia are modernizing their air forces. Going European, some analysts say, also could complicate future U.S.-Japan air defense cooperation.

Lobbying has intensified as Japan nears a long-delayed decision on what will be its next generation of fighters, or "F-X" fighters, after it retires much of its current fleet. The deal is expected to involve 40 or 50 new planes.

Because of Japan's close military ties with Washington, options such as the Lockheed F-35 and Boeing F/A-18 have long been the top contenders, and analysts say the U.S. advantage remains strong.

But the four-country consortium that builds the Eurofighter is benefiting from a tail wind created by the U.S. decision not to sell Japan what it really wanted _ the stealthy F-22 "Raptor" _ and by production delays and cost overruns that have shadowed the F-35.

"Eurofighter Typhoon is the most capable aircraft available to Japan. It is the world's leading multi-role platform with outstanding air-to-air capability," Jon Bonnick, a spokesman for the British BAE Systems division spearheading the Eurofighter deal, told The Associated Press in an e-mail.

The plane is built by a consortium of European military manufacturers led by BAE Systems PLC, the German-French EADS NV and Italy's Finmeccanica SpA.

Planners in Tokyo have been alarmed by the rapidly advancing capabilities of neighboring China, which recently rolled out its next-generation stealth fighter, the much-touted Chengdu J-20. Though that fighter may be years away from actual operations, it is seen as a rival to the F-22 and far superior to what Japan now has.

Even without the J-20 shock, Japan was under increasing pressure to replace its aging F-4EJ and F-15 fighters. It had initially planned to make a decision in 2007, but has repeatedly pushed back its deadline amid budget and bureaucratic battles...

...Now, delays suggest the F-35, another stealthy, state-of-the-art option, will not be available until 2020 [emphasis added], which could leave a longer-than-acceptable gap for Japan.

Enter the Eurofighter, which is not as advanced as the F-22 or F-35 _ known as fifth-generation fighters_ but is already in service...

A big part of the Eurofighter sales pitch is that it will not tightly restrict the transfer of technology, which means some of it could eventually be built in Japan _ a significant plus for Japanese planners concerned with domestic industry. The U.S. options may not be as generous...

Boeing said it remains confident it has the best plane.

"We believe the F/A-18EF Super Hornet Block II is the most realistic option for Japan's F-X," said Jim Armington, a vice president at Boeing Defense Systems.

Choosing the Typhoon could lead to some bumps ahead for Japan, [Michael] Auslin [analyst with the American Enterprise Institute] said

"Not to have what we assume will be the most capable fighter available to allies, the F-35, I think would cause difficulties down the road," he said. "Especially as Chinese and Russian air forces modernize, Japan would not be operating at the level of other U.S. allies, like Great Britain, Australia, and even South Korea."..

Mark
Ottawa

 

[CougarKing]

>

link

Portrait of a femme fatale who brought down China's elite
By Clifford Coonan In Beijing

Saturday, 19 February 2011
Li Wei's story of seducing businessmen is detailed in 'Caijing' magazine

A respected magazine has provided the most detailed picture yet of the complex life of a billionaire businesswoman responsible for the downfall of some China's most powerful figures in a sex-and-corruption saga that has gripped the nation.


Li Wei slept with up to 15 top business and party figures before turning on some of them in a series of corruption cases to save herself from a long prison sentence, according to Caijing business magazine. Her contacts book contained some of the most powerful men in the land, as she used her beauty to break into the secretive bastion of powerful men that tightly control China, according to the magazine.

Ms Li was jailed on tax fraud charges in 2006 but was released early this year and now lives in Hong Kong. The magazine alleges that she was released early because her diary contains fresh allegations of "immoral relationships" with "high-ranking officials", which is code for officials at the most senior levels in the land.

Ms Li reportedly created a vast network of protection and favour in the provinces in Yunnan, Guangdong, Beijing and Qingdao to build a multibillion-pound business empire in return for sexual favours. As her corrupt protectors went to jail, she turned herself in and was given a lenient jail term.

"You cannot invest all your resources and opportunities into one person, you have to construct a huge relationship net, like an umbrella," Ms Li was quoted as saying by Chinese media. Her empire at its peak consisted of more than 20 companies in Beijing, Qingdao, Shenzhen, Hong Kong and overseas, in industries including tobacco, real estate and advertising. She owned 183 petrol stations in Beijing.

A great friend of Wang Yi, vice-chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, her shares and bonds did very well. Her assets were at one point worth about £1bn.

Born in Vietnam in 1963 of mixed French-Vietnamese parentage, she moved at the age of seven with her father to Yunnan province in search of a better life. She sold tobacco as a youngster, but her ability to manipulate the arcane system of building connections, combined with her considerable allure, transformed her into a formidable power broker.

Zheng Shaodong, the former chief investigations officer at the Ministry of Public Security in Guangdong province, got her a residence permit. After earning legitimate resident status, she married a top official at the local tobacco bureau.

Through her husband, Ms Li managed to gain access to former Yunnan governor Li Jiating, who became her lover. She helped him get resident status for his son in Hong Kong in exchange for tobacco export quotas. The governor narrowly escaped the death sentence in 2003 for taking more than £19m in bribes.

Ms Li became involved with Du Shicheng, the former party secretary of the rich city of Qingdao in Shandong province. Through her relationship with Mr Du, she secured top-notch real estate in Qingdao, a coastal city that was once a German protectorate, and soon became one of the city's biggest property developers.

Mr Du introduced her to his good friend, Chen Tonghai, the chairman of Sinopec, China's oil and gas giant. He too became Ms Li's lover, and he gave her gifts of millions of shares in companies owned by Sinopec.

Mr Du's revelations about his friend's corrupt activities precipitated Mr Chen's downfall. He was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve. Ms Li's testimony was central to the conviction of many of the officials she entertained in her boudoir.

Some of her former lovers are serving time in Beijing's Qincheng high-security prison, which primarily houses political prisoners but has been used for corrupt cadres.

Aware that corruption could undermine the rule of the Communist Party, the leadership has organised several high-profile campaigns in the last few years to try to stamp out graft.

According to a survey by state prosecutors, more than 90 per cent of the country's senior officials punished on serious graft charges in the past five years have kept mistresses.

The victims

*Chen Tonghai

Ex-chairman of China's second-largest oil company, Sinopec, given a suspended death penalty in 2009 for taking 196m yuan (£17.5m) in bribes.

*Li Jiating

Ex-governor of Yunnan province, sentenced to death for corruption in 2003. Thought to be in Qincheng Prison, Beijing.

*Liu Zhihua

The ex-vice-mayor of Beijing, who supervised preparations for the 2008 Olympics, was sentenced to death in 2008 for taking $1.45m in bribes. His sentence may be commuted to life imprisonment.

*Zheng Shaodong

Ex-head of China's Economic Criminal Investigation Bureau received a suspended death sentence for corruption.

*Huang Songyou

The ex-deputy head of the Supreme Court is currently serving a life sentence for embezzlement and receiving bribes worth £500,000.