← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · EDUMAKATEDMOFO
Thread ID: 15446 | Posts: 8 | Started: 2004-10-26
2004-10-26 20:41 | User Profile
World - AP Asia
Powell's China Comments Anger Taiwanese
Tue Oct 26,12:51 PM ET World - AP Asia
By WILLIAM FOREMAN, Associated Press Writer
TAIPEI, Taiwan - Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) has angered Taiwanese officials and lawmakers by making unusually strong comments denying that the island is an independent nation and suggesting Taiwan should unify with China.
AP Photo
Washington usually avoids weighing in on the touchy split, which arose when Mao Zedong's communist army won control of the Chinese mainland in 1949 and anti-communist forces took refuge on Taiwan.
But Powell waded into the unification question Monday in interviews with CNN and Hong Kong-based Phoenix Television during a one-day visit to China.
According to a State Department transcript, Powell told Phoenix: "There is only one China. Taiwan is not independent. It does not enjoy sovereignty as a nation, and that remains our policy, our firm policy."
read the rest...
[url]http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20041026/ap_on_re_as/taiwan_us_china_1[/url]
2004-10-26 21:21 | User Profile
Nixon made a big mistake when he did not insist on permanent protection for Taiwan when he "normalized" relations with Red China. China would likely to have agreed as it was so eager to curry favor with the usa. Taiwan should be permitted to go its own way, and we should not insist on her falling into the lap of the communists. I feel the same way for any region that wants to depart from a dictatorial megastate and has democratic support for doing so.
2004-10-27 01:51 | User Profile
[QUOTE=solutrian]I feel the same way for any region that wants to depart from a dictatorial megastate and has democratic support for doing so.[/QUOTE]
Back in the USA, the federal government's strong control of the public schools in all 50 states has assured a homogeneousness of thought and loyalty to the feds that no state is going to be trying to leave the union anytime soon. If any state tries to leave the union in the coming decades, it will be the Mexican-"Americans" trying to depart with the south-western states.
Regarding China and Taiwan, Powell is just sharing the view of the Bush administraiton. That's the view of an administration that has nothing but contempt for the Common Man, including the common Taiwanese man.
2004-10-27 02:29 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Happy Hacker]Regarding China and Taiwan, Powell is just sharing the view of the Bush administraiton. That's the view of an administration that has nothing but contempt for the Common Man, including the common Taiwanese man.[/QUOTE] Oddly enough, if you feel strongly about Taiwanese independence, you are basicaly going along with the neo-cons and against Pat Buchanan. Pat stresses, "realism" in Eastern affairs, while the neo-cons more stress interventionism.
Personally, I and other conservatives, especially religious conservatives, I know feel a strong sentimental attachment toward Taiwanese independence, and don't really fully understand Buchanan's and other paleo's hard line here, thinking its a little just anti neo-con contraryism.
In any case, I think what's interesting here is the timing of Powell's announcement. I suspect the administration is starting to realize its getting over its head in Iraq, and is trying to cut its losses and committments elsewhere. Which is exactly what paleo's are most worried about - that too interventionist a foreign policy will leave us weak in the areas we most need to be strong in.
2004-10-27 02:52 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Okiereddust]Oddly enough, if you feel strongly about Taiwanese independence, you are basicaly going along with the neo-cons and against Pat Buchanan. Pat stresses, "realism" in Eastern affairs, while the neo-cons more stress interventionism.[/QUOTE]
Huh???
[url]http://www.buchanan.org/pma-99-0721-taiwan.html[/url]
DES MOINES, IA -- Today, Republican Presidential candidate Patrick J. Buchanan released the following statement:
"With the Beijing regime almost daily issuing threats of force and violence against the people of Taiwan, it is imperative that the Republican Party in Congress not sign on to the Clinton/Gore policy of appeasement.
"The special trade privileges that have allowed Beijing to pile up $274 billion in trade surpluses this decade, at our expense, should be suspended.
"It is that massive trade surplus and the hard currency it has provided that has enabled Communist China to buy and build weapons to put the island and people of Taiwan in mortal peril.
"According to the Washington Times (7/21), the Clinton administration is considering a cut-off in the sale of defensive weapons to Taiwan. If true, that would be an act of treachery utterly un-American in character."
[url]http://www.buchanan.org/pa-00-0302-chinachoatepressclub.html[/url]
[url]http://www.buchanan.org/pa-98-0707.html[/url]
2004-10-27 12:22 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Texas Dissident]Huh??? ........... "The special trade privileges that have allowed Beijing to pile up $274 billion in trade surpluses this decade, at our expense, should be suspended.
"It is that massive trade surplus and the hard currency it has provided that has enabled Communist China to buy and build weapons to put the island and people of Taiwan in mortal peril. ............. [/QUOTE] Pat does seem to have some twists and turns in his "America First" isolationism, which isn't uniform, as the hardcore isolationists like AntiYuppie use to criticize him on (such as his suport for our involvement in Vietnam). Here I see him putting an "anti-free trade with China" spin on the whole China/Taiwan issue. His policy is thus nuanced, but his "don't go to war with China over Taiwan" philosophy, which has been his most publically known policy pronouncement certainly doesn't seem negated by by occasional pronouncements such as this.
2004-10-27 15:54 | User Profile
It goes against every paleo value I hold to support China's claim on Taiwan.
2004-10-27 18:26 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Happy Hacker]It goes against every paleo value I hold to support China's claim on Taiwan.[/QUOTE] Well the issue is a complicated one. If Taiwanese were western thinking people, who had always maintained their independence, I would agree with you. But its really a lot different than that, especially if you've ever met Taiwanese.
After all, historically the concept of "one China" has always been the official policy of both the mainland and Taiwanese governments. Only recently(the last 10 years or so) has the independence movement gained political currency in Taiwan. So I'm not sure how strongly even the Taiwanese themselves really support the concept.
There are other arguments to be made too of course, both pro and con. Overall though I think Buchanan's case certainly can be defended from a paleo viewpoint, athough logically and even more emotionally I personally tend to disagree also.