The Albanese government’s Defence Strategic Review is marred from the outset by its bald assertion that China’s military build-up is the largest and most ambitious of any country since the end of the Second World War. (more…)
Category: China
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China’s “Historic” push for multipolar world to end U.S. domination
This is a historic watershed that the world is living through right now. What China is after is true multilateralism. What’s very important to understand is that most of the world also does not want the U.S. as the global preeminent power. Most of the world wants a truly multipolar world, and is, therefore, not lined up behind the United States’ sanctions on Russia, says Jeffrey Sachs in an interview with Democracy now. (more…)
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Does the Vatican’s road to Beijing run through Hong Kong?
An invitation to visit Beijing was issued late last year to Stephen Chow, Sau-yan, the Catholic Bishop of Hong Kong. His recently completed visit is the first by a Catholic Bishop of Hong Kong to the Mainland since the recovery of Hong Kong by China in July, 1997. It may help provide a strengthened framework for the continuing dialogue between the Vatican and Beijing as they each proceed with their diplomatic long-game. (more…)
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Australia’s China illiteracy has dangerous consequences
The deficiency of Australia’s Asia literacy — and as a subset, China literacy — has been recognised for decades by successive federal governments. Despite government investments to boost Asia literacy, the result has been dismal. (more…)
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US hypocrisy: serial rules-breaker forfeits global credibility
On May 3, 2021, when the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, was interviewed by 60 Minutes, he said, “Our purpose is not to contain China, to hold it back, to keep it down. It is to uphold the rules-based order that China is posing a threat to.” (more…)
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Anti-China witch hunt intensifies with Csergo arrest
In the Csergo case the big question is: does the prosecution have any evidence of a real crime and not just a breach of the ridiculous Reckless Foreign Interference law? (more…)
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China has put the US in the “too hard” basket
“Keep Calm and Carry On” posters should be put up in all Canberra government departments. The British Ministry of Information produced the original of this meme in 1939 to prevent public panic about widely predicted German air attacks. A new version is needed in Australia in 2023 to counter fears of imminent invasion and subversion by China. (more…)
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The dangerous one is the U.S.
The implication of AUKUS is that China constitutes a danger to Australian security. It borders on official Australian policy that China is an aggressive power bent on domination. But the history of the People’s Republic suggests its military is for defence, not aggression and that the cases where it has used external military force are very few. Under Xi Jinping it may be assertive and keen to extend influence, especially economic, but it shows no signs of political/military aggression. On the contrary, it is the U.S. that constantly uses external military force and is bent on maintaining domination at all costs. (more…)
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Australian journalists in China: Send them back!
In August, it will be three years since Australia’s China-based correspondents were harried out of China. In an extraordinary over-reaction, the ABC, Fairfax, and News Corp closed their offices in Beijing and Shanghai. (more…)
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The troubled love lives of China’s rural migrants
For the past decade or so, the Western media has been critical of the Chinese state, the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party. This criticism has been made in the context of a small number of issues, such as human rights in Xinjiang, political dissent in Hong Kong and Western citizens detained in China. (more…)
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An education strategy to combat Australia’s “China threat”
In recent years a contemporary China Threat narrative has emerged in Australia and elsewhere related to defence capabilities. An equally important China Threat though, is ignorance. Our knowledge of China and our Chinese communities has declined dramatically over the last thirteen years. How can we combat this threat? (more…)
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‘The media normalises war-mongering’: how Chinese Australians respond to talk of war in mainstream media
Early this month, the Daily Mail published a story online implying three Chinese men taking photos at the Avalon Airshow in Melbourne were spies. After complaints and an open letter condemning the paper for racially profiling the Chinese communities and throwing around baseless accusations, the story disappeared from the Mail’s site without explanation. (more…)
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Stop preparing to participate in a US war against China
Dear Labor MPs, I write to convey my deep disappointment in the Labor Government, of which you are part, specifically in relation to the AuKUS submarine deal but more generally in relation to military strategy and foreign policy. (more…)
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The gatekeepers have spoken
Since 1901, the often-self-appointed gatekeepers of Australia’s defence and diplomacy have had the greatest difficulty with the idea of accountability. (more…)
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China and the AUKUS submarine deal: unanswered questions
The challenge of 2045
Australia will have access to American nuclear submarines in the early 2030s and by 2045 will have been building its own. But it is not clear what problem will be solved when Australian long-range nuclear submarines are able to traverse the northern Pacific. (more…)
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The myth of Australian sovereignty
As AUKUS propagandising gathers pace, the Australian public is being softened up to believe that whatever else the arrangement entails (and that still mostly remains a mystery), there will be no compromising of Australia’s sovereignty – none whatsoever. History teaches us that such reassurances can be dangerously hollow. (more…)
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Rainbow alert on China
Crikey sets its sights on “human rights abuse” of China’s LGBTQI+ community relying on a single source for its investigation – the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. (more…)
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Dear reader, are we unwelcome in this white man’s nation?
I am an Australian-born person of Chinese ancestry and have been disturbed by the alarmist fearmongering and drive to war with China from the media and the government. While I have been a faithful public servant and model citizen for many years, once again I am sadly returned to my childhood traumas and anxieties about being unwelcome and unworthy in this white man’s nation. (more…)
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The return of the paranoid American foreign policy
When a severe political cancer returns after a period of remission, we have a recurrence. In serious cases, cells from the original cancer regrow and spread virulently. One of America’s best-known commentators, Fareed Zakaria, recently compared the current grave dysfunctionality and panic-driven decision making in Washington to the worst of the McCarthy era in the 1950s. (more…)
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How can it be that Australia has actually gone backwards in knowledge of China?!
At exactly the same time as proclaimed “experts” from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute are telling us to prepare for war with China within three years or so, people who have done proper research on the situation with China studies are saying our record is disappointing, indeed getting worse, not better. (more…)
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Championing war with China
In an extraordinary editorial that was labelled as warmongering by former prime minister Paul Keating, the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) called for China to be labelled a clear and present threat, argued for the reintroduction of conscription and for long range missiles armed with nuclear weapons, and urged Australia to prepare for war with China in three years. (more…)
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China: decoupling from the West and winning the long game
With the re-opening of China and with the ending of Covid restrictions, a new confidence seems to be surging through the country. While the next two years are seen to be a particularly dangerous time, with the real prospect of armed conflict with the US, beyond that it is felt that China’s time will have come. Australians are now largely denied this view since the timorous Australian media is no longer present in China. (more…)
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The SMH and Age Red Alert is unwarranted and dangerous
The articles published last week by the SMH and Age under the heading, Red Alert, are deeply flawed. The intent seems to panic us into war. But the many assertions are not supported by evidence or credible argument. (more…)
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Why China has passed the United States in science and technology
In recent weeks there have been a multitude of news items and reports emanating from various quarters indicting China has passed the United States in science and technology and this is likely an irreversible trend. (more…)
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Who are the ‘gang of five’ pushing Australia to war?
The Age and Sydney Morning Herald have failed to publish, except in the most cursory sense, the current or recent past associations of their gang of five experts who apparently believe Australia could be at war with China in as little as three years. (more…)
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Combating ‘China is the real enemy’, MSM saturation messaging
Over many months now, when talking to relatives, friends, acquaintances and strangers about the current, parlous state of geo-politics and how the world is moving ever closer to world war, and a possible, uncontrolled nuclear conflagration, the retort I often receive develops something along the following lines: “Yes, we know the U.S. is a war-like country and a danger to world peace but, don’t you think Australia needs to throw its lot in with them militarily, in order to counter the even more pressing threat from China which is an aggressive, imperialist power seeking to control Australia’s own backyard?” (more…)
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Capital city newspapers urge nuclear war by Australia against China: God help us
The Sydney Morning Herald’s prominent series of provocations, urging Australia into a war with China, concluded its third instalment today. (more…)
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We are being led to war with China to satisfy American hegemonic interests
As the American Empire is attempting to open up another war front with China and dragging us into it, the Doomsday clock is now 10 seconds to midnight. Can we resist? (more…)
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No, it’s not a joke: China threat theory more alive than ever
The idea that China is lusting after Australian territory is part of the fervid imagination of the worst China hawks. It simply isn’t true. (more…)
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The greatest propaganda campaign in human history
China is the victim of the largest and greatest propaganda campaign in human history. Whether this is a sign of things to come or an aberration based around a particular point in time remains to be seen but propaganda it is. (more…)