China is NOT our friend

By Edward Smallwood

[Edited 4-28-08 at 12:09 AM.] I found an excellent diary post at The Daily Kos about one of the points below. I have added in the information, and included a link in the sources.[-Ed]

Sorry this post is so late. This was going to be a simpler post, but once I started looking for information, it kept getting bigger. Sources are posted at the end of the essay.

Sometimes I have to work at coming up with a good topic for a blog entry, and sometimes one just comes out and smacks me in the head. This is one of the latter ones. For those of you who have known me for some time, this essay will sound familiar. I have been saying this for some time, to the point where I sound like a broken record at times. (I hope most of you understand what a record is, and why I might sound like a broken one.)

There has been a problematic misconception that our politicians have had since President Nixon’s February 1972 trip to China: That China can be, or is, our friend. This idea is false in every respect. China is openly hostile to us politically, economically, fiscally, militarily, and in virtually every other way.

Let’s go over these and other points about China’s attitude toward the United States.

Military: China has been getting ready for a war with the United States for quite some time. The un-provoked war we started with Iraq convinced them that they need to accelerate their plans for this war. They have stated publicly in their own newspapers for a long time that they thought conflict was inevitable, largely over resources. Think about it: Their population is rapidly moving toward our lifestyle, which uses a lot of resources. In fact, they are already using more resources than we are in many critical areas. They have been spying on our military for as long as I can remember, and the recent Pentagon Spying case shows that they are still doing so.

For years Chinese hackers have been attempting to penetrate Pentagon computer networks, with some success. This is not the act of a friendly nation.

We must get ready for a possible conflict with China, but more importantly, we should do what we can to avoid this. Avoidance does not mean placating China. The best way to avoid conflict involves using fewer resources, which is good for us in any case. Using less oil and coal is the best thing we can do for ourselves and the global environment, while possibly preventing war. The same goes for recycling. Sounds like a win-win to me.

Fiscal Policy: Over the last eight years, our country has foolishly been going into debt at a rate never before seen. Much of this has been to finance an unnecessary war. One of the biggest problems with this has been that China has been buying as much of this debt as they could, to the amount of $3965.27 per U.S. Taxpayer. This puts them in at least partial control of our economy. As long as the interests of the United States and China are the same, or at least parallel, this is not a problem. The instant our interests are at loggerheads we have a problem. China could call the debt due, or more likely, unload our debt on the market, making it worthless. If this should happen, it would make it difficult for our country to borrow money to do necessary things, such as fund our military. It would also make it difficult to borrow money on a personal level to do important things, such as buy groceries or cars. We need to stop borrowing money to fund a war that we do not need and to start paying back as much as we can, and we need to stop giving rich people a free ride and start taxing them their fair share.

Politically: China does not allow dissent within their own borders, and now, they are going after people who do not like the Chinese government outside their borders. When Jack Cafferty on CNN said something the Chinese government didn’t like, they unleashed hackers to bring down CNN’s website. I would hardly be surprised if they tried a Denial of Service attack on my website because of my views.

In addition, when the news came out that some pet and human foods that came from China had been tainted with Melamine, our FDA was required to investigate. In front of Congress, these investigators said that the government of China was “fully cooperating.” Under questioning, it was uncovered that “fully cooperating” meant that the factory that these ingredients came from was shut down before FDA investigators could arrive, that those investigators were not given access to anyone who worked there, and that they were not allowed to actually, you know, investigate anything. Why would these same investigators claim that China was “fully cooperating?” Could it be political pressure from China? Could it be anything else?

It is well known that both Yahoo and Google have helped the Chinese Government suppress dissent within their borders. Considering their relationship, is it possible that the Chinese Government may indeed pressure these companies to suppress any statement that they may not like, regardless of where it is made?

Economically: When Chinese made toys for young children sold under Mattel’s brand were found to contain unsafe levels of lead, who do you think Mattel had to apologize to; their customers who bought the toys and exposed their children to lead, or the Chinese government? If you chose the Chinese government, you would be correct.

This is ignoring the common act of dumping Chinese made products in the U.S., products made for less than it cost to make them. This is always done in order to destroy another country’s ability to make the same product, regardless of which country is guilty of doing this. In China’s defense, many other countries have done this to us in the past, including South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan, all countries that are said to be friendly to the United States. However, the fact that the government of China is involved in this dumping makes this a more serious issue.

We must start putting tariffs on goods that are being dumped in our country. We must also start testing goods coming into our country to make sure they are meeting our safety standards. Are you aware that only one person at the Consumer Product Safety Commission is responsible for testing all of the toys in the country for lead? We need to increase the number of people checking for product and food safety immediately.

Environment: Last year, China surpassed the United States for amount of greenhouse-gasses released. Their air pollution is actually affecting air quality in the United States due to the fact that they do not have the air quality standards or enforcement that we do in our country, and air doesn’t stay put. In fact, they are opening a new coal-fired electrical power plant every six days currently.

We need to start pressuring China to enforce their own environmental laws, while reducing the amount of pollutants we ourselves are putting into the environment.

So, the Chinese are taking our jobs, selling us dangerous products at below cost, planning on going to war with us, poisoning our food, polluting everyone’s air, and then telling us to shut the heck up over all of it. Is any of this the act of a friend? What would you think of someone who lived next to you and treated you this way? Would you think of them as your friend?

I personally consider the Government of China to be the biggest threat not just to the United States, but to the safety and freedom of everyone on the planet. We desperately need to start disinvesting in China, regardless of the profit potential. Profit cannot be exchanged for safety or freedom. We also must disengage politically from them until they start changing their behavior. They must start to clean up their environment. They must start to allow freedom. Our current involvement is not helping the Chinese citizens as much as it is harming us, and this needs to change. Now.

Sources:

War preparations:

“Is China preparing for war with U.S.?” by ZACHARY HUBBARD, The Tribune-Democrat (Johnstown, PA), August 24, 2007, http://www.tribune-democrat.com/editorials/local_story_236133107.html

“China readies for future U.S. fight” By CNN Senior China Analyst Willy Wo-Lap Lam
Tuesday, March 25, 2003, http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/east/03/24/willy.column/

“China Prepares U.S. War Scenarios”, By John Leicester, Associated Press Writer
Sunday, Oct. 22, 2000, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20001022/aponline122800_000.htm


”China Rapidly Modernizes for War With U.S.”, by Alexandr Nemets,
Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2004, http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2004/8/9/172001.shtml

Military Spying:

“Former Pentagon official pleads guilty in China spy case” by Simon Montlake from the April 2, 2008 edition Christian Science Monitor, http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0401/p99s01-duts.html

Chinese Hacking of the Pentagon:

“China's Army Hacked Pentagon Network”, Deutsche Presse-Agentur, September 05, 2007, http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,148037,00.html?ESRC=dod-b.nl

“Chinese hackers: No site is safe”, By John Vause, CNN, http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/03/07/china.hackers/index.html

China owns U.S. Debt:

“Our view on national fiscal security: Look who owns U.S. debt now”, Editorial of USAToday, http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2006/12/post_1.html

“Did you know you owed $3,935 to the Chinese Government?!”, by yaddab, The Daily Kos, Sat Apr 26, 2008 at 06:34:59 PM PDT, http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/26/161131/223/438/503996

China squelching international dissent:

“Chinese hackers disable CNN.com for three hours”, by Liam Tung, ZDNet.com.au

23 April 2008, http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/Chinese-hackers-disable-CNN-com-for-three-hours/0,130061744,339288382,00.htm

“Mattel Apologizes to China Over Recalls”, By ALEX VEIGA AP Business Writer
LOS ANGELES Sep 21, 2007 (AP), http://www.abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=3636583

China tainted food investigation:

“DURBIN, DELAURO MEET WITH VON ESCHENBACH; URGE CHINESE GOVERNMENT TO COOPERATE ON PET FOOD CONTAMINATION INVESTIGATION”, Wednesday, April 18, 2007, Press release from office of Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Il), http://www.durbin.senate.gov/record.cfm?id=272635

“China admits tainted food link”, By Calum MacLeod, USA TODAY, http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/2007-04-26-pet-food-china_N.htm

Search Engines helping Chinese Government suppress dissent:

“Lawmakers Berate Yahoo Execs”, Grant Gross, IDG News Service, Tuesday, November 06, 2007 1:00 PM PST, http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,139347-page,1/article.html

“Google to censor China Web searches”, By Elinor Mills, Staff Writer, CNET News.com, January 24, 2006 7:25 PM PST, http://www.news.com/Google-to-censor-China-Web-searches/2100-1028_3-6030784.html

“Google’s shifting moral ground”, By Dan Farber, January 25th, 2006, http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=2476

“Google's China Filtering Draws Fire”, By Jay Lyman, TechNewsWorld, 12/01/04, http://www.technewsworld.com/story/38573.html?welcome=1209333758

Chinese greenhouse gases and air pollution:

“China says coal use surging despite environmental worries”, The Associated Press, July 25, 2007, http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/25/business/AS-FIN-China-Coal-Consumption.php

“Coal power-Still going strong”, Nov 15th 2007, From The Economist print edition, http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10145492

“A WARMING WORLD--China about to pass U.S. as world's top generator of greenhouse gases”, Robert Collier, San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer, Monday, March 5, 2007, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/05/MNG18OFHF21.DTL

China dumping products:

“Anti-dumping Duties Imposed on Hand Trucks Imported from China”, Posted on November 15, 2004, http://www.usembassy-china.org.cn/press/release/2004/111504ant.html

“Dumping Cases on China Imports Rise Since WTO Accession”, By Bruce Odessey, Washington File Staff Writer, March 2005, http://usinfo.state.gov/ei/Archive/2005/Mar/10-388477.html