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Posted on 10/13/2003 1:05:48 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
China's launch of a manned, Earth-orbiting satellite symbolizes a great nation's accelerating return to its normal position of global technological leadership.
Contrary to the stereotype common in the West of pre-modern China as a land of technological stagnation, for most of its history China was one of the leading technological powers of the world.
The great historian of Chinese science and technology, Joseph Needham, found 26 basic technological innovations made in China and subsequently transferred to the West, compared to four innovations made in the West and transferred to China. One of the subway stations in Beijing is decorated with murals celebrating China's "four great inventions": gunpowder, the compass, printing and paper. China is now returning to the position of technological leadership it held throughout most of history.
The Chinese people are immensely proud of their ancient technological achievements and convinced that China's falling-behind the West in this regard over the past several centuries was an aberration. Or, it was the result of vicious Western imperialism that deliberately sought to suppress China.
Pride in high profile and immensely difficult technological achievements such as space exploration are seen by most Chinese as testament to China's reclaiming of its rightful place in the sun.
Some Chinese believe in their hearts that Chinese are really superior to Westerners in terms of basic abilities and see China's growing technological prowess as confirmation of these racial prejudices. Popular appeal is one reason why the Chinese government is able to invest vast sums in an ambitious space program, even though China faces immense social needs. Achievements in space exploration also allow the Chinese government to claim it is blotting out the past century of "humiliation" of China.
A large part of China's space technology came from Russia. In the 1950s, China's acquired basic rocket technology from its Soviet ally. It also acquired substantial assistance from Qian Xuesen, a Cal Tech-trained physicist who worked on rocket development at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the United States during the 1940s. These sources facilitated China's effort to launch its first satellite in 1970. Then when Beijing and Moscow began restoring friendly cooperation in 1989-1990, space was identified as an area with great potential for cooperation. Over the next decade China basically bought and cloned the former Soviet space program.
Assimilation of foreign technology is not, however, a reason to disparage China's achievements in space. The United States space program in the 1950s and 1960s drew deeply on German technology. The key to technological prowess is not relying only on your own resources, but scouring the earth to find and assimilate the most advanced knowledge available anywhere in the world. After a long period of self-satisfied "self-reliance" under both traditional and Red emperors, China has finally learned this lesson.
Nationalist Chinese writers talk about a Chinese colony on the moon and exploration of the other planets. China's economic rise will probably provide the government the fiscal resources necessary to pursue these dreams.
The United States seems to have lost interest in vigorous space exploration. Perhaps a good dose of Chinese competition will rekindle American enthusiasm. In any case, the United States will have to learn to live with a China that is restoring its long-lost position of global technological leadership.
John Garver is a professor of international affairs at Georgia Tech.
Red Dragon Rising: China's Space Program Driven by Military Ambitions
CHINA'S NEW FRONTIER: U.S. threw out man who put China in space [Excerpt] As World War II wound down, Tsien was made a colonel in the U.S. Army Air Forces and sent to Europe in 1945. His mission: Size up the German V-2 rocket program developed by Hitler's Third Reich.
There, he met and interviewed young Wernher von Braun, the V-2 project's technical director who one day would become the visionary behind the Saturn V rocket that put America on the moon. During their meeting, Tsien asked von Braun to put down on paper German breakthroughs and future space goals. The resulting report is credited with helping inspire development of the first U.S. satellites.
After the war, Tsien became the youngest full professor on the faculty at MIT. During a 1947 visit to see his family in China, he met Jiang Ying, a glamorous aristocrat who studied music in Germany and was one of China's most celebrated young sopranos. Her father -- a military adviser for Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist government -- was helping wage a civil war aimed at crushing Mao Tse Tung's communist rebels.
The couple married later that year and moved back to America. When Tsien re-entered the United States in Honolulu, he reflexively answered "no" to a question on an immigration form asking whether he had ever belonged to a group advocating overthrow of the U.S. government. [End Excerpt]
(December 10, 2001) CHINA'S NEW FRONTIER China finds launches lucrative [Excerpt] There also were accusations -- adamantly denied -- that Loral's chairman influenced a Clinton administration licensing decision with a hefty donation to the Democratic National Committee. License approval eventually was shifted from the Commerce Department to the more restrictive State Department.
The Clinton White House announced in November 2000 that it would resume processing export licenses and extend China's launch privileges through 2001 after Beijing agreed to a missile nonproliferation pact. But the Bush administration says outstanding issues remain in implementing the nonproliferation agreement. New satellite export licenses remain on hold. Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., and three other lawmakers urged President Bush in July not to resume licensing under any condition. [End Excerpt]
December 09, 2001) China's great leap forward: Space [Excerpt] "The space industry is not only a reflection of the comprehensive national strength but also an important tool for leaping over the traditional developing stage," said Liu Jibin, minister of China's Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense.
If China makes that leap, the country's civil and military space efforts could close the gap between East and West in years instead of decades. Technology is critical to China's development of bigger, better missiles and space-based defenses as well as the country's commercial ambitions. Market reforms and cheap labor already are turning a once-stagnant, planned economy into a powerhouse.
Signs of the transformation can be seen everywhere in China's cities. Bumper-to-bumper car traffic has replaced bicycle gridlock. McDonald's and Kentucky Fried Chicken are almost as common as traditional roadside food stalls. Chairman Mao's wardrobe has been mothballed in favor of Western fashions. Handbills and posters are more likely to tout the qualities of European cigarettes than the virtues of class struggle.
One thing, however, hasn't changed: Most of China's space program remains closed to the outside world. Even so, a few Chinese officials are cautiously -- almost reluctantly -- beginning to open up.
A two-week tour of Chinese aerospace facilities this fall and talks with high-level managers, many of whom have been off-limits to Americans, revealed this about the country's mysterious manned program:
China likely will launch its first astronaut sometime in 2003 after six or so unpiloted test flights of its manned spacecraft. The next test flight -- the third overall -- is expected to blast off before the end of January.
Preliminary design of a Chinese space station already is under way. A modest outpost with limited capabilities could be developed during the next decade.
And there's even talk of sending people to the moon and building lunar bases in the next decade. [End Excerpt]
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"Everyone can see how Communism rots the soul of a nation; how it makes it abject and hungry in peace, and proves it base and abominable in war." - Winston Churchill, referring to Finland's accomplishments over Soviet Russia early in WWII.
I have some experience with this attitude, and have found that not "Some Chinese believe in their hearts that Chinese are really superior to Westerners in terms of basic abilities" as much as "Almost all Chinese believe in their hearts that Chinese are really superior to Westerners in terms of basic abilities, morality, understanding, and virtue." I would go farther and call my words a vast understatement. Take the American view of Africans from 1900 and multiply by ten. Although I am certain not to be believed by most readers, more accurately multiply by one hundred!
The Korean slang word for Africans (and Koreans are not culturally or genetically very different from Chinese when compared to Westerners) is translated accurately as "rock apes." The Chinese are still somewhat intimidated by caucasians and so caucasians are rarely insulted to their faces (although ask one his opinion of Russians!), even though westerners are not seen by Chinese as much different from Africans.
So don't get a swelled head!
If China becomes the third nation to send an astronaut into space, as it plans to do on Wednesday, its top leaders will be sending a new message, to two audiences.
To the rest of the world, China is displaying its growing technological prowess, staking its claim to a future role in space and reasserting its case for being considered a power equal to the United States.
To its own people, the Chinese leadership hopes to stir pride and nationalism and to prove that the Communist Party, rather than being a dinosaur, is capable of the most technical of achievements. A full-throttle propaganda campaign is under way, with huge coverage in state-run newspapers and a 20-part series about the space program about to run on state-run television.
"It's primarily about showing the world; it's about prestige," said Brian Harvey, author of a 1998 book about the Chinese space program. "It's a vindication of their political system." ***
I remember with affection the culture shock experienced by other GIs when they first experienced East Asia. They meant well, but were uniformly lost children far from home.
But can we say our Clintons are better than their Clintons? Probably not.
Actually the result of the Opium Trade. Great Britain produced opium in its colony in India, and then shipped it to China for sale. Although China resisted, Britain was militarily superior.
Imagine what the cocaine trade from Colombia to the US would be like if it were run by a militarily superior power.
Actually the result of the Opium Trade. Great Britain produced opium in its colony in India, and then shipped it to China for sale. Although China resisted, Britain was militarily superior.
Imagine what the cocaine trade from Colombia to the US would be like if it were run by a militarily superior power.
Not many people know the shameful history of the opium wars. As a teenager - my Dad was posted to Hong Kong - and it was there I learned about how Hong Kong came into being:
Here at The Western World (shades of Steely Dan), people liked silk - and were willing to pay exorbitant sums for it. Good thing, because China would only take gold and silver and would't buy squat from the West (Deja Vu all over again). Britain (and the US) said "Well, this won't do, we're exhausting our national treasuries" - and their marketing guys got together to figger out how to generate demand for something..ANYTHING...that they could hock to the Chinese.
Opium was the answer - and the Brits had plenty of it in India. Plus, when they drove into 5th and MLK boulevard with the stuff, they could outgun the local cops with 102-gun ships of the line.
The local governor declared a WOD, and one thing led to another - and it turned into a real shooting war, albeit the shooting came primarily from the side with the guns - and the left-over boxers usually danced to avoid the bullets, until a bullet took them out anyway...so much for magic.
The local Brit Admiral was in charge of postwar negotiations to exact Britain's and the West's tribute. It was then that trade was forcibly instigated - thru trade missions in Shanghai and other port cities - but the big enchilada was Hong Kong - in the visionary view of the Admiral, who saw Hong Kong harbor as one of the premier deep-water ports in Asia.
Hong Kong was thus ceded to the Brits as a BCC - British Crown Colony - and the Admiral hurried back to England with the good news. He was summarily sacked by the Queen - who was royally PO'ed that all that war expense had gotten them exactly 29.4 square miles of barren rock (Hong Kong Island), 2-odd square miles of the mainland (Kowloon), and the humiliating requirement to lease the 377 square miles of greater Hong Kong (New Territories) that the Admiral had wanted.
However, it turned out to be one of the most lucrative deals the Brits ever made, for them and China. History sometimes works in frikked-up ways.
Most encouragement to muslim nations and to enemies of the west comes from china. Pray to heaven for help - we need it now. There are more Christian conversions in asia and africa than anywhere else - but they may not occur fast enough to prevent future confrontations with "the middle kingdom"
The biggest problem of the western world today is the lack of will to face reality. Our leaders and institutions slant the truth and squelch any initiative to actively support our own well being in the name of "diversity", a common buzzword that acts like a free pass.
In reality, confusion and lack of common purpose grease the skids and "the west" continues to slip slide away into oblivion.
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