<we can discuss facts>
Can we?
Trying to convince a patriot, that their nation has waged a War of Aggression, a War of Conquest, is like trying to convince an Evangelical, that the world wasn't really created in 7 days.
I've been through this discussion, in great detail, with Patriot Americans, and Patriot Israelis, and I have little hope that Patriot Chinese can be any more honest about their own tribe. Your statement, that all Chinese wars since 1949 have been in self-defense, is a statement that probably 99% of all non-Chinese disagree with. Just like, most non-Americans can easily see that our war in Iraq is a War of Conquest, but almost no Americans see it that way.
Here is what R. Kipling wrote in 1899, to convince Americans that killing 300,000 Philippinos was a noble deed:
Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought...
fordham.edu
All you have to do, is change it to:
"Take up the Chinese Man's burden--"
and you have your anthem.
All successful nations reach a point where, in their arrogance and pride, they decide they are the Chosen People, whose culture or race is exceptional and superior, and therefore they have a right and duty to rule the Others, the Heathens, the Savages (that is, everyone but themselves). Next, they convince themselves, that any amount of butchery, ethnic cleansing, or oppression is justified, in the pursuit of their noble civilizing mission. Ancient Greeks thought this way, ancient Romans, the Brits in their days of imperial glory, Americans today.....and Chinese next.
This is exactly what China has been doing, since 1949, in Tibet and East Turkestan (Xinjiang to you). A violent conquest was followed by colonization, and periodic massacres of the native peoples. These two lands had been independent nations, with their own distinct cultures and languages, and not part of the Chinese Empire, for most of the last 2000 years. If China wasn't following the same bloody path as all other Empires, Tibet and East Turkestan would have been allowed to become independent nations. |
