Posted on 07/19/2002 11:34:14 AM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
Edited on 07/12/2004 3:55:47 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The United States is imposing economic sanctions on eight Chinese companies for selling destabilizing arms and germ-weapons materials to Iran, The Washington Times has learned.
The administration for the fourth time since September has singled out Beijing's state-run companies for violating U.S. laws aimed at curbing transfers of weapons and arms-related goods to rogue states.
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
I wonder if this is true.
the U.S. government should deny all trade privileges to the sanctioned firms and also target their parent companies
If these are state-run companies, doesn't that make the Chinese government the actual "parent company"?
If you know the history of COSCO, that's the LEAST they deserve.
What Has History Taught Us?
by Roger Ford
Suppressed speech. Religious oppression. Suffocation of an independent press. An economy run by the state to serve the end goals of the state. Relegation of the individual to slavery. Sound familiar. You say: Communist Russia. You are wrong. Mainland China.
From the end of World War II to the end of the 1980’s the United States stood with our Allies in Europe and around the world, waging a battle to contain and defeat the Soviet Union. Words such as “domino theory” and “red menace” came into the lexicon; words that today seem almost archaic. If history has taught us anything, is that it sometimes pays to be honest and forthright. Simply put: China presents a clear threat to freedom-loving people the world over.
What baffles me is that most elected officials and business leaders are selecting a path of ‘engagement’ that transfers our most advanced technologies and creates a trade deficit from the import of cheap goods made with enslaved labor. The worst of it is the fact that many of the companies are simply front organizations for the Chinese military and allied industries. Yes, we’re simply financing the build-up and modernization of the Chinese military with our money and preferential economic treaties.
Why is it that we continue to blindly look at China’s belligerent behavior with naïve ambivalence? Why is it their military occupation of vital naval chokepoints and installations right here in our hemisphere, such as the Panama Canal Zone, causes no alarm? Moves such as these 20 years ago by the former Soviet Union would have been viewed as acts of aggression against our Nation.
The newly released Pentagon report has sounded the warning bell: “The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is said to be spending [possibly as much as an 18% increase this year over last with some analysts suggesting 4x’s over last year’s budget] and innovating with an eye on broader aims: supporting its economic rise and countering the United States as a Pacific ‘adversary’. China’s leaders view the military as necessary to ensure that China’s economic power will rise; to protect important national interests; and to support China’s eventual emergence as a great power and the preeminent power in Asia.”—Pentagon Report
What disturbs me are the apologists who call for free trade, who join the chorus calling for engagement and calling China a strategic partner. China’s own statements indicate they do not want to be a strategic partner. Their intention is to push the United States out of Asia, then use their military muscle to threaten our friends and allies, such as Japan and the Philippines.
What has history taught us? Little or nothing, if we fail to recognize that communism is not dead. It is alive and well in China. Communism’s expansionist tendencies still exist and it dictators are still determined to enslave mankind under the yoke of state-sponsored repression. Witness the acts China’s military government commits against their own people (and the people of Tibet): the forced abortions; the economic enslavement of the working class and the murder of Christian missionaries—to name a few examples.
Remember what has history taught us: “Throughout history it has been the inaction of those who could have acted, the indifference of those who should have known better, the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most, that has made it possible for evil to triumph.” – Haile Selassie
Let us resolve ourselves to vigilance and move forward to meet the challenge before us.
A much more effective way of doing things would be for instance, "sell weapons tech to Iraq and we will sanction your country"....then turn around and place a stiff two year import quota on all Chinese textiles coming to the US markets. Cut 'em in half or more...on top of that, sanction these individual companies.
Attack their major industries and they will start to listen. Much more effective.
Essentially we need to open our options in relation to China. We need to put our business community in its place.
"On July 9, we made a decision to impose sanctions on ten entities pursuant to these laws (which prohibit transfer of sensitive material to Iran and Iraq). We will be reporting to Congress shortly," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said, without disclosing the identities and nationalities of these companies.
However, an unnamed State Department official was quoted as saying that one Indian and nine Chinese companies would be slapped with the sanctions.
The action will be taken under Iran-Iraq Arms Non-Proliferation Act of 1992 and the Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act of 1991, Boucher said.
Eight entities are being sanctioned under both the Acts, while two will face the measure under the Iran-Iraq Non-Proliferation Act, for transfers to Iran or Iraq of goods or technology that contribute to their eforts to acquire weapons.
Boucher left unclear whether any of the companies are being sanctioned for transfers to Iraq. Media reports said the sales in September 2000 and October 2001 involve three transfers of advanced conventional arms and chemical and weapons, violating the Iran-Iraq Non-Proliferation Act of 1992.
The Act mandates sanctions against companies or governments that make sales that "could materially contribute to either country's acquiring chemical, biological, nuclear or destabilising numbers and types of advanced conventional weapons."
What the he!! good does this do when the companies are all government owned and operated anyway?
We have to stop doing business with Communist China Inc. PERIOD!!!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.