On Waking Sleeping Giants

On Waking Sleeping Giants

By Dave Lindorff

Created Apr 11 2008 - 9:07am

During my six-year sojourn in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, one of the things

I came away with was a sense of how generally un-nationalistic and

non-patriotic the Chinese people were.

Caught up in the struggle first to simply survive and then, in the mid-90s,

to try and grab onto the moving train that was China's new Great Leap into

Capitalism, average mainland Chinese, whether out in the remote farmlands of

western Anhui Province or in the rundown house lining the hutongs of

Shanghai or Beijing, had no time for patriotic displays or nationalistic

concerns.

When Chinese Communist Party leaders in Beijing would beat the drum of

nationalism over Taiwanese independence efforts in the 1990s, it evoked

mostly yawns among average Chinese people, and in fact, to Beijing's

embarrassment, a popular computer game featured a war-game in which Taiwan

defeated the People's Liberation Army.

That all started to change when the US, early in the first term of President

George W. Bush, taunted the Chinese by flying a spy plane into Chinese

airspace, damaging a Chinese fighter jet that flew up to intercept it, and

getting forced down itself on Hainan Island. That incident aroused a lot of

anger among ordinary Chinese who felt that the US was pushing their country

around, and who felt pride at their country's willingness and ability to

stand tough and take the American plane hostage.

Now, the Tibet uprising, which has garnered global support, particularly in

Europe and the US, has further inflamed Chinese nationalism, with most

Chinese seeing Tibet as part of China's historic imperial realm, and the

global backing for Tibet nationalists as a throwback to 19th Century and

early 20th Century imperialist attacks on China by the West.

In a way, the Tibetan riots have been a golden opportunity for China's

sclerotic Communist Party leadership, which has been feeling growing

pressure to open up the political system, but which can now ride a wave of

unthinking nationalism and push those democratic pressures aside, at least

for a time (much as 9-11 allowed Bush and Cheney to do the same to

democratic traditions and the rule of law in the US).

The 2008 Olympics set for Beijing, which many Chinese democrats had hoped

would force China to open up space for them, thanks to the wave of western

tourists and journalists and all the global media attention that they would

bring to the country, will now be held under tight police guard on the

largely trumped-up excuse of threats of Tibetan terrorism.

There is a lesson here for America, though I doubt that the policymakers in

Washington are of a mind to take it. That lesson applies to Iran.

The neoconservatives who have dominated the Bush administration, and who

appear to be gaining the ear of Republican presidential presumptive nominee

John McCain, and whose neoliberal relatives in the Democratic Leadership

Council also seem to have Hillary Clinton in their pocket, all talk of

taking a hard line with Iran over its alleged efforts to develop nuclear

weapons. Bush and Vice President Cheney talk openly of attacking Iran, and

indeed Cheney may have been preparing for just such a disastrous action with

his so-called "peace trip" to the Middle East last month (a trip that was

followed by a nationwide five-day mobilization in Israel, and by calls from

the Saudi government for preparations for a possible wave of nuclear fallout

to hit that country). McCain, meanwhile, has entertained supporters by

bastardizing a Beach Boys hit and singing "Bomb, Bomb, Bomb! Bomb Iran!"

Hillary Clinton, for her part, signed on to a war-mongering piece of

legislation sponsored a few months ago by Senate warmonger-in-chief Joe

Lieberman (D-CT), which gratuitously designated the Iranian Revolutionary

Guard as a "global terrorist" organization--an open invitation for Bush to

order an attack on military bases in Iran.

The problem with this mad strategy of attacking Iran is that its effect

would be to galvanize the Iranian people, who like the Chinese, currently

have little love for their repressive theocratic government, and little

interest in nationalist heroics, not to mention little innate hostility

towards America, and to turn them into super-patriots ready to fight and die

for their country.

Like China, Iran is an ancient and proud civilization, and one of the oldest

continuous polities in the world today. Its culture, thousands of years old,

helped to engender what we today call Western civilization. Its writers,

poets, musicians, scientists and artists have produced ideas and creations

to rival those of any other nation on the globe.

If the US were to attack Iran--even if that attack were carefully targeted

at only government buildings, nuclear facilities and military bases--the

country's largely apolitical population would predictably stand together as

one to rally in defense of their nation. Just as the Chinese people have

rallied 'round the flag as China is attacked--in this case from within by

Tibetan separatists and from without by supporters of a Free Tibet--Iranians

would rally 'round the flag if their country came under attack--especially

if that attack came from the same country which undermined and overthrew

their popular democratically elected government half a century ago,

installing the hated Shah.

Now talk about stupid policies!

I agree that China has no business owning Tibet--any more than the US should

own Puerto Rico or the Virgin Islands, or the lands it stole from the

indigenous peoples of America. And I agree that the mullahs who rule Iran

with an iron hand are a despicable bunch of bigots and misogynous sociopaths

who should go back to their mosques and stay out of politics--just as

bone-headed fundamentalist church leaders should stay out of politics here.

But threatening these countries, as America did with its spy plane flights

near China in 2001 and with its current rhetoric about "regime change" in

and war against Iran, is not the way to achieve those ends.

If China ultimately lets Tibetans have self-determination or independence,

it will be because the Tibetans demanded it and because the Chinese people

agreed to let them have it--or it will be because central authority in

China, and with it control over its boundaries--has collapsed, as it

historically has done a number of times.

Similarly, the if Iran ultimately ousts its theocratic leadership and

returns to the democratic path so abruptly derailed by the CIA two

generations ago, it will be because its own long-suffering people made that

change, not because of the American military and America's blustery leaders.

In fact, American politicians and generals can only delay that day by their

threats and by any actual ill-conceived military action.

--

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Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107

"A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their

spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their

government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are

suffering deeply in spirit,

and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public

debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have

patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning

back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at

stake."

-Thomas Jefferson