Comments on: China can’t make it rain

By: Sam

Sam — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 02:15:03 +0000

It is not true that an “ever-increasing number of Taiwanese favor reunification with the mainland.” An ever-increasing number of Taiwanese understand themselves as “Taiwanese” not simply “Chinese.” In interviews with leading KMT officials last month, I was struck by how all of them now say: “I am Taiwanese.” Ma Yin-jeou, the likely next president, from the KMT, has said that he will not enter into negotiations about reunification. Many Taiwanese are fed up with Chen Shui-bian, the current president, and his policies of inflaming relations with both the PRC and the US. Many Taiwanese prefer the ambiguous “status quo,” which is a de facto independence without provoking the PRC. While Taiwanese business enjoys access to Chinese labor and markets, very few are thinking about reunification in concrete terms – not for the next century or so….

By: Anurag

Anurag — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 20:40:48 +0000

Not to mention that an ever-increasing number of Taiwanese favor reunification with the mainland.

By: mpowell

mpowell — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 17:32:47 +0000

Not to mention that China would give up more than 10 years of growth by actually engaging in war with Taiwan.

By: abb1

abb1 — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 13:43:26 +0000

The thing about Taiwan is that I think it’s quite obvious that the current government of the PRC is so pragmatic and careful that the invasion is completely out of the question. It seems more likely that the US will invade Canada than the PRC Taiwan.

By: s.e.

s.e. — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 13:41:35 +0000

More importantly economic and informal social relations between PRC and Taiwan are are strong and growing.

By: soru

soru — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 12:59:38 +0000

As the Taiwanese military is half a million strong, better equipped than the mainland, on an island, had 50 years to build defences, and a military ally of the US, I don’t see how Chinese casualties in a successful invasion could be expected to be as low as a million.

The panda plan might work though.

By: john b

john b — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 12:29:19 +0000

I like the ‘pandas’ point the most: “for every hour that you refuse to accept our annexation of Taiwan, we’ll decapitate a cute little panda on telly. How’d’you like that, Western imperialist running-dogs?”

By: Alex

Alex — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 11:27:05 +0000

China’s list of 5 things they were willing to sacrifice over Taiwan, and the list included something roughly along the lines of a million soldiers, 10 years of economic growth, membership of the WTO, all the Pandas in China, and the Olympics.

I have to say I don’t believe a fucking word. If they cared enough to lose as many men as the UK in the First World War, they would act. And if they bombed Taiwan they’d lose the semiconductor suppliers to pretty much the entire Chinese electronics industry, not to mention whatever happens when Shanghai’s electricity supply gets bombed and the ships stop calling.

By: abb1

abb1 — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 09:53:35 +0000

The thing about propaganda – pretty much anything can be used for propaganda. There’s no bad publicity. All the decent people in the world love you, the evil ones hate you. Evil people making scenes at the opening ceremony can’t embarrass you; it’s just another proof of you being perfect.

By: mark

mark — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 01:11:44 +0000

“According to the British Petroleum statistical review by late 2005, the country produced 379 million b/d and by late 2006 more than 450.000
b/d.”. Incidentally, this is apparently expected to peak in 2008.

But even if we accept the argument that pressure-on-the-Chinese-to-pressure-Khartoum will have little impact on the Darfur conflict, should we really be that upset at activism that may makes Chinese state companies that little bit less likely to deal so brazenly with unsavoury regimes abroad?

(Of course, as sg suggests, we should perhaps be more focused on the unsavoury regime at home…)

By: seth edenbaum

seth edenbaum — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 01:08:53 +0000

China’s relation to africa is complex. In the long I think it’ll be helpful.
I was impressed by China when I was there. I oppose the government, but I respect it. It’s not a simple adversary.
I was supposed to go back in the spring but that’s off. I’m going back though.
And my big market error of the year was not investing in Chinese Solar. I ignored the advice. Big mistake. “My favorite broker” is cursing himself.
It’s the regional authorities who are only interested in short term gain. Beijing is worried.

By: SG

SG — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 00:39:42 +0000

I remember reading China’s list of 5 things they were willing to sacrifice over Taiwan, and the list included something roughly along the lines of a million soldiers, 10 years of economic growth, membership of the WTO, all the Pandas in China, and the Olympics. I think they value the Olympics as a propaganda device, but it won’t trump their rather serious need for resources and a space where they can develop competitively (e.g. Africa).

Also I’m pissed that Steven Spielberg would throw in the towel over Darfur, but everything else in China – the prison camps, Tibet and the environmental problems – don’t get a look in. At the risk of starting a condemnathon, he seems to think that mass murder by a muslim nation separate to china is more important in his dealings with China than mass murder by China itself. Or maybe he just hates Richard Gere (and who doesn’t?)

By: dsquared

dsquared — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 00:30:43 +0000

I have Sudan producing 344kbbl in 2004, with ambitions to get to 500kbbl by 2005. And of course, it’s all about the reserves rather than current production, so I think that calculation could be off by a factor of four or five.

By: soru

soru — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 23:24:39 +0000

Follow the money.

Sudanese oil production is 250,000 barrels per day, or ~ 10 billion dollars a year. If an extortionate 20% of that money goes to a chinese oil company, that is $20 billion over a decade, and the reserves won’t last much longer than that.

That’s almost exactly equal to the 2012 olympic budget, and, as pointed out above, the legitimisation value of it to the Beijing regime is almost certainly much higher than it is to Brown.

Estimates of the Chinese annual defence budget range from US$25 billion to $90 billion. That provides a reasonable estimate of the size of the stakes involved – in comparison, Sudanese oil revenues are small beer.

Of course, what you don’t want to do if cause the chinese state to forget the Olympics and seek legitimacy by the traditional route of a short victorious war…

By: seth edenbaum

seth edenbaum — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 23:10:06 +0000

Living in Beijing for Sept/Oct last year, I think I have to agree with the other commenters about the significance.

“your life is getting better (for some of you, materially at least)”
Actually it’s getting better for the vast majority, but the rates of change are also vastly different.

“The Party relies on performance legitimacy,”
If only that were true of our own government.