China

In New York, you cannot ride a subway without being bombarded with posters about Darfur and now, Tibet. Of course I have sympathy for those killed and displaced in Darfur, though the numbers have been overblown and other specifics of the situation have been exaggerated. And I am a sucker for all plainly legitimate secessionist movements, as in Tibet. But I am quite sick of being guilted into protest and “action” with the purpose of fixing problems my government is in no way (currently) responsible for.

The Tibet march poster I saw yesterday mentioned the “atrocities” perpetrated by the Chinese government. How about the atrocities carried out, abetted, enabled, and inspired by the US Government in Iraq? The death toll in Iraq beats last month’s entire cluster of clashes in Tibet practically every hour. Why, outside of a few stickers on newspaper boxes around town, is no significant mention made of what’s going on non-stop in Iraq? Are mainstream liberals just so cowed by the see-through rhetoric of the now completely debunked War Party that they still refuse to criticize a war their military is currently prosecuting?

Why are they demurely and cowardly “supporting the troops” in Iraq while wasting their rage on bullsh*t like a police crackdown against rioters in Tibet? This goes all the way up to top liberals in the country — the disgusting Nancy Pelosi tells the President he should boycott the Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing. Who is George Bush to express moral indignation about anything? France’s Sarkozy is just as ridiculous — he rubs his face in Bush’s crack as the Decider bends over to destroy another piece of Iraq, but is contemplating a boycott of the Olympics opening ceremonies over a few scuffles in Lhasa?

Sick.

How about some priorities reevaluation?

Last weekend was quietly marked by the 50th anniversary of the modern-day peace symbol. While it continues to remain a cultural icon, its history and imagery is relatively unknown.

As seen in the picture, the design incorporated symbols from the flag-signaling alphabet. The N + D were placed “within a circle symbolising Earth” where the N stood for nuclear and D stood for disarmament. Thus its creators used it to promote peace through global nuclear disarmament.

Last Saturday, half way around the world, another important political event took place in Taiwan. The sometimes-hawkish independence movement led by the DPP was defeated in the national election versus the trade-friendly KMT. One of the promises president-elect Ma has promoted is closer, peaceful trade with mainland China.

As Frederic Bastiat, Lew Rockwell and others have noted, when goods and services do not cross borders, armies will. And with $100 billion in cross-straits trade in 2007 alone, many residents felt that war with the PRC would be needlessly destructive to their enterprises and employees.

The DPP-led initiative for UN recognition also failed at the ballot box. And as the DPP stronghold is located here in Kaohsiung, an hour ago I walked down to the corner of Boai and Jhihsheng and watched workers dismantle the local “UN for Taiwan” building. And if the surrounding commercial hustle and bustle is any guide, perhaps a productive flea market will take its place in the near future.

This story comes full circle as the US Air Force was recently discovered to have accidentally sent 4 nuclear detonators to Taiwan. While this is itself a curiously negligent faux pas, the triggers are nearly 50 years old… designed for Mark-12 nuclear weapons which were decommissioned in 1962.

The state and its imperial class is the only group that gains in the event of war, nuclear or otherwise. And as cooler heads have recently prevailed, perhaps the Year of the Rat will be one of wealth and prosperity and not war and atrocities. Or maybe as Doug Bandow suggests, the crisis has only been postponed.

See also:
Taiwan: do as we say, not as we do
The Vatican still recognizes them, right?
5 Reasons Why the PRC will not Invade Taiwan shortly after the Olympics

Today is a national holiday here in Taiwan. It is Peace Memorial Day which reflects upon a bloody suppression instigated by the KMT more than 60 years ago.

And while you can hear the occasional loud speaker commemorating it in the background, most of the political class is focused on the diplomatic snub a Taiwanese delegation experienced yesterday.

After being sent to Seoul to observe the inaugural ceremony for the new Korean president, the Taiwanese representatives were asked not to attend due to pressure from the Chinese delegation which threatened to boycott the event.

As I mentioned earlier this month, despite the harsh rhetoric and diplomatic threats expounded on by either party, any military confrontation between the PRC and RoC seems unlikely for the near-future. And while it is improbable that the South Korean State department will ever change its stance, this May they too will have a chance to reflect upon the anniversary of a government-sanctioned violent repression.

In the spirit of the day and towards a peaceful coexistence you may be interested in: How to Deal with a Threatening Island. It stands in stark contrast to contemporary anti-trade agitprop like this.

I know that if at first you don’t succeed, you’re supposed to try, try again. But I think that phrase needs an exception: do not keep trying the same thing over and over again, especially after you fail 100 times in as many years.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband should take this to heart, given his country’s embarrassing failure in exporting democracy through colonization and occupation — not to mention the planned starvation of sanctions and the mass murder of war. But no, he stands defiant in the face of reality, insisting that the debacle in Afghanistan and the horror show in Iraq is just another flawless intervention that just went a little wrong because of a few “mistakes.”

He makes a case for endless interventions around the globe for various foreign offenses — and then unwittingly shows himself up by bringing up the miracle of China. Commerce brought wealth and power to the masses of China, not “humanitarian intervention.” The state has done nothing but fight, tooth and nail, the advances of peaceful humanity on every front. The 20th Century was its last great push. It is finally losing, and the tide of prosperity and cooperation is shifting to overtake misery, poverty, and war. If the power-hungry, bloodthirsty, warmongering — or if you prefer, downright stupid — likes of Miliband would just step aside and allow people to decide for themselves what they want, we’d get there a lot faster.