The Horse Has Bolted!

I have just turned 75, still reasonably robust except for a damaged heel pad – after being mowed down by a reckless cab driver in Singapore in 2016 – which does cause my two thighs to be somewhat weighed down baggage when I walk. It is no big deal; I continue to do about an hour of walk every morning and another half an hour or so in the evening, thanks to my very disciplined wife. The other activity that keeps me ‘young’ is writing. I have written two books on geopolitics, and I blogged often until I appeared to have suddenly dropped out four months or so ago.

There was no personal crisis. I just felt quite helpless, after watching the day-in-and-day out sufferings of the Palestinians in the wake of Benjamin Netanyahu’s determination to wipe them out of Gaza – in retaliation of Hamas’s attack on October 7 last year. In an ironic twist, the apparent genocide also helps to bring out the true colour of America, which I will talk more about it later.

But my restlessness has got the better of me. I decided to pick up my pen – rather, to start punching away at the keyboard of my study’s desktop – after reading and watching news footages on the recent collapse of the Baltimore bridge. But before I could tidy up my composition, I read that Xi Jinping and Joe Biden had exchanged telephone conversation again. And this was quickly followed by Janet Yellen’s visit to China.

US Officials’ Visits to China? Not Again!

As expected, Yellen went home empty-handed. Notwithstanding, Antony Blinken and Llyod Austin will visit soon,

The fact of the matter is: they can keep visiting and talking and threatening, little will change. Biden is semi-demented; nobody is in overall charge in Washington. Each Cabinet member is for himself or herself. They are doing everything possible to try to help Biden get elected, so that their jobs are safe. Only the Deep State, not Biden, is doing the ‘orchestrating.’

Blinken is a headless chicken. His present preoccupation is to make himself loved by the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (I am a strong believer of physiognomy, Blinken’s confidence inadequacy is written all over his face.) But Netanyahu does not care two hoods about what Biden says. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will continue to seek revenge for the Huawei’s Mate Pro 60 humiliation she suffered while she was visiting China in September last year. (Again, my physiognomy crystal ball says to me that her face carries a trace that only a mother will trust.) As long as she is in office, more and more sanctions will be instituted against China’s high-tech firms, especially Huawei. And the ‘big potato’ Austin will go along with the US admirals to order more and more drills with its allies in South China Sea. You do not see Katherine Tai, but I read that she is telling Europeans this reality: Hi guys, if you do not fall in line with us, we will all get wiped out by China soon.

Come November, Americans will cast their presidential votes again. Chances are poor for Biden to get re-elected. Although his standing in the world has plummeted in the wake of the Gaza crisis, it is still not a big vote killer because much of America is still blinded by Israeli-friendly media, thanks to big Jewish money there.

To turn the tide, Biden has to tell American that he is the goliath in the ‘war’ against China. But I am afraid the horse has already bolted!

An Economics Professor not knowing the ABCs of Economics?

Yellen talked about the overcapacity in China that is hurting the ‘world,’ which to her is America. Aren’t cheaper products better for the world? I can only say this: Her knowledge of macro-economics is shallower than many first-year economics students! And she was once a senior professor in Economics? And who is she to lecture the Chinese government to pay its workers higher wages?

I suspect she is not that dumb. But she has got so sucked in by the system that she has become another political stooge in the Biden administration. Never mind about good economics!

The cold truth is America has lost its ability to manufacture anything competitively. Heard of any white goods from America now? What about mobile phones? Any decent EV? Even all the heavy dock cranes have to come from China!

The only weapon left in America’s arsenal are the chips. Even then they are not very good in manufacturing these. All they have are the patent rights in several key manufacturing processes. If they do not stop ASML in selling China DUV, let alone EUV, machines, China will overwhelm the world with cabbage-price chips. They also want ASML to stop providing after-sales services to those machines that have already been installed in China. This is outright barbaric!

Yellen also went on to threaten that if Chinese banks continue to facilitate Russia, America may also consider sanctioning them.

Surely people like Yellen understands these threats are in fact bad for market economies like the US’s. Depriving firms like ASML of one of its most valued customers will only mean one thing: Less money for it to spend on research to scale new heights. Possibly because of this dilemma, the outgoing Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte saw fit to pay China a visit – just before Yellen’s do. But can the new man or woman ward off Raimondo’s heavy stick?

But the Horse has already Bolted!

It was recently reported in South China Morning Post that China might soon be able to do 5nm chips without the help of EUVs. (No one could believe that Huawei could come up with a 7nm equivalent in its Mate 60 Pro in August last year either! But this is China!)

It is a fact China will still be unable to do the more advanced chips for some time. (It has ample expertise to design them though.) But these are not the do-or-die stuff in the next couple of years. China has already surpassed the US on many fronts. (Australia’s anti-China thinktank, Australia Strategic Policy Institute, has long published an article on this.) The things we see every day in our house are already mainly made or designed in China. Hisense and Haier had captured much of the lower-end market even in countries like Australia, but instead of pursuing Michael Porter’s low-volume-high-margin model as they climb the quality ladder, many are adopting the high-volume-high-quality-good-affordability business model instead. BYD is a case in point, within a short number of years, it has become the largest EV maker in the world. Shein and Temu are edging out Amazon, so has TikTok with Facebook. No wonder the US and Europe are bent in stopping China. How? All in the name of national security! (Now even the tall cranes, which have been dominating the skylines in many American ports for many years, are deemed security risks by the Americans. Little do they realize that their fridges and television sets have been spying on them for years!)

By now, China has built some 3.5 million 5G base stations; the US’s number two years ago was about 100,000. It cannot be much more today. If not for the US sanctions, China would have ushered the world solidly into Industrial Revolution 4.0.

However, more frightening to the US is China’s progress in Space and Military technology. The latter’s missile technology has long surpassed the US’s. If a war were to break up in the South China Sea today and if US ships were to sail within China’s first island chain, I dare say that part of the sea would be their graveyard. (They therefore need the Japanese, Koreans, Filipinos and naturally the Taiwanese to die for them there instead.)

China has also made huge progress in space exploration and satellite navigation system. US’s own experts are admitting that China’s BeiDou is already more advanced than theirs. Its space station Tiangong is doing all sorts of experiments. Without Russia’s help, the West’s International Space Station will soon have to close shop. And China is now preparing hard to land on the Moon within the next couple of years.

(US claims that they were the first to land on the Moon, but the last landing was made by Apollo 17 in 1972, more than 50 years ago! My late eldest brother used to tell me that America’s first landing was fake, which I did not take it with any seriousness – until I began to watch carefully the arguments put up by investigators on the footages of the landing. I am not sure now that in fact it had happened!)

China was still a pathetic mess to the Americans when Richard Nixon visited Beijing in 1972. Most of the subsequent American Presidents did not viewed China as a threat – until China applied for WTO membership. Bill Clinton gave Zhu Rongji a hard time. It was finally admitted in December 2001 – during the presidency of George Bush.

It was also during President Clinton’s time when the Chinese container ship Yinhe (银河) was forced to set adrift after it refused America’s demand to board the ship to inspect its cargoes in the international waters of the Indian Ocean in July 1993. Yinhe was suspected of carrying chemical weapon materials to Iran, which was sanctioned by America. The Americans killed its GPS, leaving the ship totally unnavigable. It finally yielded, but nothing incriminating was found. Yet no apology was offered.

America’s arrogance was deafening. China knew it had to start its own BeiDou navigation system.

(Friends may remember that this is the same Clinton when the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, in the then Yugoslavia, was bombed by NATO (in reality, the US) in May 1999. Three Chinese journalists were killed. China could only protest; the US did not bother to offer a decent apology.

There was also an American spy plane incident in Hainan in April 2001, when George Bush has just assumed American presidency. A US Navy EP-3E and a Chinese interceptor collided in mid-air, resulting in the American plane being forced to make an emergency landing on the Hainan Island. (The Chinese pilot was killed in the incident.) A vague apology was issued by the US to secure the crew’s release. (Bush governed America from January 2001 to January 2009 and was too preoccupied with his war on Terror. He did not bother China too much.)

When you are suppressed, like what China has been subjected to all these years, you achieve wonders!

Blinkered Economists and Thinkers all over the World

I have been forwarded an hour-long video footage featuring a discourse hosted by the Asia Society. The speakers were Kishore Mahbubani and Erza Vogel. Friends should be familiar with Kishore, but Vogel may need some introduction, even though he is a world-class academic. Vogel is the author of China and Japan – Facing History. I am quite familiar with Kishore’s lines of thinking and did not quite want to hear from an old gramophone However, Vogel’s voice was new to me; I thought I should give it a go. Within 20 minutes, I got totally turned off by Vogel’s understanding of China. I could not believe that a man of that seniority in academia could parrot of what we often read about China in the Western and pro-West media.

The discourse reminded me of a function I attended in Melbourne in November 2023. My son-in-law was unable to make it to a talk given by ANZ’s Chief Economist Richard Yetsenga about the outlook of China and he asked me to attend instead.

Yetsenga argued that China’s growth had peaked, and it should in due course trace the trajectory that had plagued Japan. i.e., flat growth at best. He had all the trend lines to back his argument. He took pain to say that China’s ‘phenomenal’ growth was not a case of exceptionalism, as many economists have claimed. But to me, he is another conventional analyst. He does not understand China. Period.

After the talk, ten of us, including the speaker, were hosted to a dinner at the University House. I could not help pointing to Yetsenga that I did not agree with his conclusion and stressed that China is indeed a case of exceptionalism! I thought he had missed out the most important aspect of this exceptionalism: Chineseness! However, I doubt he understood the point I was trying to bring home. However, what surprised me was the attitude of another guest: a certain Prof Lisa Cameron. She was in total agreement with Yetsenga’s observations and conclusion, which she was fully entitled to do. And she was actually quite contemptuous of China and even suggested that the hundred years of humiliation it suffered in the hands of the West and Japan was largely a make-believe narrative. I was aghast by her callousness and could not help rubbishing her in a very ungentlemanly manner. I offered to debate her if she had the time one day! She did not even see fit to give me her calling card!

Yes, China was facing headwinds at that point of time. But see how the tide has changed just within a matter of months, even though China’s economy is still being weighed down by its real estate woes.

The Western and Pro-west Sicko Media

Discerning viewers had always known that CNN, Fox New were the mouthpieces of America’s Democratic Party and Republican Party, respectively. Any issue that they think will influence their viewership will be flogged to death with their round-the-clock panel of ‘experts’ or ‘influencers.’ When young, my teachers always urged us to listen to BBC to improve our English. It did exhibit a very high level of journalistic professionalism. No longer; thanks to their stars like Stephen Sackur. The Economist was a must read for those who occupied positions of significance in politics and business, and opinions of the New York Times, the Washington Post, Financial Times, and Nikkei were also greatly welcomed. But thanks to Biden’s USD500 million hand-outs to help shape these media’s way to convey ‘truths’, they now have been largely discredited. Who believe in their Xinjiang forced labour, or pro-democracy suppression in Hong Kong exposés anymore? Yet they continue to churn out distorted news and developments about China. To a great extent, you can understand; after all, they are Anglo-Saxon media. But how can journalists from East Asia be so dumb?

I suspect many of them are already in America’s pocket. Nikkei is the worst of the lot. Honest journalists like Seymour Hersh (who named the culprit behind the Nord Stream blast) and John Pilger (the late Australian journalist who was a strong critic of American, Australian, and British foreign policy which he considered to be driven by an imperialist and colonialist agenda) were largely marginalised. Instead, you have sickos like mad dog Australian journalist Peter Hartcher who continued to bark at China without any credible cause. (Australia has a good share in this cesspool. John Garnaut is another one, even though his father was a very distinguished scholar and diplomat.)

I used to be a regular subscriber of some of these so-called authoritative newspapers and weeklies. I no longer do, even with the regional and local papers and TV channels, several journalists of which, I suspect, have been compromised.

Fortunately, the world has alternative media to inform now, especially with TikTok. No doubt there is also a lot of fake stuff in these media, nonetheless, they get flushed out in no time.

A Black Swan Event? No, no, no…

The Baltimore disaster reminded me of an incident when CNN screamed in its 24 July 2021 headline: US fails to win medal on first day of Summer Olympics for the first time in nearly 50 years. It prompted me to write a blog entitled “What do the Tokyo Olympics 2020 Say about America” on 26 July the same year. It attracted some 45K readers.

What has the Baltimore bridge disaster had anything to do with US’s failure to win a medal in the first day of that Olympics?

They share a common thread: something is fundamentally wrong with America now.

Many would describe the Baltimore catastrophe as a black swan event. The probability of it occurring must be one in a million.

Yet it happened.

Every Anti-China platform in America was looking for a trace to pin down China in this accident. The ship must have had something to do with China!

But MV Dali is a 90,000-tonne Singapore-registered container ship, built by Hyundai, owned by Grace Ocean Pte Ltd and operated by Synergy Marine Group. Both the captain and the crew were Indian. So are the top guns in Synergy Marine.

If it is owned by China, Biden would have acted like Trump when corona virus first broke out – shooting his forefinger in the air and with saliva flying from his mouth, screaming “China! China! China!”

They did not find anything to incriminate China.

But CIA might not have worked hard enough. They should have searched the offices of Grace Ocean and Synergy Marine, maybe the tea-lady is Chinese? Of why they have chosen to christen the ship Dali, which sounds like a city in Yunan, China?

The bridge was completed in 1977 and is a part of Interstate 695 and a critical transportation link on the East Coast to one of the largest ports in the US. It was built at a time when container ships were quite a rarity. And have the harbour masters in the US kept up with the latest SOPs to manage such possibilities?

Remember the goal that Argentina footballer Diego Maradona scored during the quarter final match in 1986 FIFA World Cup? It was termed “the hand of God.” Maradona did acknowledge that he had “handled” the ball, but he considered the goal to be a symbolic revenge for the United Kingdom’s victory over Argentina in the Falklands War four years earlier.

A friend said this was “karma” against the US for standing firm behind Israelis’ genocide in Gaza. Maybe it was that hand that made the ship slam the bridge?

But to me, America’s performance in Tokyo 2020 Olympics and the collapse of the Baltimore bridge are indicators of the decline of an empire. And the decline is beyond salvation.

Superstitious stuff aside, let me go back to my thesis.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, who is the Fairest of Them All?

The US leaders, regardless of party colours, are like Snow White’s evil stepmother who wanted to be the fairest woman in her universe. But the China Snow White has never aspired to be the top dog on this Earth.

China began its phenomenal growth after its entry into WTO. Obama could see the unstoppable trend and started to talk about pivoting America to the West Pacific. But being an intellectual, he was not as uncouth or Machiavellian as his two successors.

Xi became the president of China in March 2013. Being a man of great foresight, he knew China had to modernise its military. It had to develop a formidable missile force and beef up its navy in the South China Sea. The rest is history.

Notwithstanding, he firmly believed in WTO.

WTO is supposed to ensure free and fair trade. And everybody has to pay the use of intellectual properties. And you do not deprive any country of a product unless it is forbidden by international agreements – like weapons of mass destruction or dangerous drugs. You cannot use the pretext of national security to ban the sale and purchase of any legitimate product. After all, even a nail could be classified as a national security risk if the logic of America leaders’ distorted minds is applied.

Xi made a speech some years ago declaring that it was time for China to look at the rest of the world “eye-to-eye” [平视 ping-shi], i.e., whoever and whatever you are, it is time for you to treat Chinese as equals. Graham Allison in his book “Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap?” published in 2017 argued that it was natural for the US to feel its position as the predominant power on this planet threatened by China – like what Sparta feared Athens which resulted in the outbreak of Peloponnesian War between them in 431 BCE. That is the very basis of zero-sum thinking! For those who have a more philosophical knowledge about Chineseness, this would certainly not happen. (The Great Wall would not have been built in the first place!) Domination in commerce, yes, and this is not a bad thing for the world.

That was the reason China did not see the need to develop its own semiconductor industry in a comprehensive manner. After all, they could buy chips from Taiwan and Korea which were already well-positioned to share the international chore. Supply-chains are supposed to be border transcending, not rendered captive by any country. Alas, US voted in a new President who did not believe in world organisations.

Trump saw the trade between the two countries was too lopsided in China’s favour. He thought he could force China’s hand with a trade war. But he is also a manipulative businessperson by nature. Despite his war cries, he did allow palms to be greased and leakages to happen, even though he had one of the most anti-China team on hand – people like Mike Pompeo and his China-born sidekick Miles Yu and John Bolton.

China had high hope on Biden, only to know his true colours when Yang Jiechi and Wang Yi met Blinken and Jake Sullivan at Alaska soon after Biden’s inauguration. Biden has proven himself to be the most vicious, yet most incompetent, of the US Presidents on China. He can speak with Xi today, yet his State, Commerce and Defence departments, not to mention the Congress, will come up with all sorts of measures to provoke China tomorrow.

The Deep State of Jewish-Media-Military-Industrial Complex

If Trump can overcome the various legal hurdles that are confronting him, which I believe he can, then it is quite certain that he is likely going to topple Biden in the November election. Trump is a non-conformist and his only cause in politics is MMGA – Make Me Great Again – which he sells to his naïve American audience as MAGA or Make America Great Again. Loyalty does not mean anything to him; everyone is dispensable in his pursuit.

All European readers could read the writing on the wall and are trying to distance themselves from Biden and scrambling to visit Xi.

Strangely, Biden’s three minions in Asia – Kishida of Japan, Yoon of South Korea, and Marcos Jnr of the Philippines – still cannot see what is coming. You can understand the stances of Kishida and Yoon; however, Marcos Jnr’s case defies commonsense. Why is he sticking his head out waiting to be chopped off? Before World War II, Filipinos would not have any idea where all the disputed islands were. Marcos’s guts are bigger than his head, He is ruling a country where halos, even for the wrong sainthood, counts more than anything else. His late father had plundered the country dried and even though he was overthrown, he had managed to hoard tens of billions overseas, principally in the US. He also wants to gather support to amend the constitution to allow a president to run a second term. Ability to show that he can stand up to the Chinese bully is a must. He does not care that much of the Philippines is still very dependent on remittances from its millions of workers all over the world. Filipinos love celebrities and glamour. And by antagonising China, Marcos is causing Filipinos to lose billions of tourist dollars and investments.

Some Rays of Hope Coming out of Taiwan?

William Lai Ching-te won the Taiwan presidential election – thanks to the Blue and White divide. His share of the votes is only about 40%. Taiwan has some of the best China affairs and cross-Strait relations commentators. Their wisdom and knowledge are second to few. Their podcasts are gaining ground in Taiwan. And former Taiwanese president Ma Ying-Jeou has just concluded his visit to China. He brought a number young Taiwanese along. There seem to be a renewed awareness that Taiwanese are after all Chinese. And with China’s standing in the world today, they can certainly feel proud to be Chinese too. However, it is still too early for me to say that the tide has turned. Taiwanese have long been left to their own devices since the Qing days. It was Nipponised for 50 years until the island was returned to China after World War II. Then Chiang Kai-Shek inflicted the White Terror on the island. China was largely dirt poor when Taiwan emerged as a tiger economy in Asia. Many Taiwanese still think mainland Chinese are uncouth. How can we allow them to overlord us?

China and Taiwan did enjoy a mutually accommodating time before the Hong Kong protestors took to the streets. In fact, Tsai Ing-wen was about to lose her re-election already. The US and the UK stepped in to fan the flame!

But reunification is Xi’s sacred mission. America knows this is the dilemma that is facing Xi today. Biden and his team are going all out to generate as much tension as possible, hoping that a proxy war can break out. The cost of a war will be devastating to China. Unfortunately, many Taiwanese continue to think the Americans are their saviours.

Nonetheless, the recent development in Gaza may usher in some hope in geopolitics.

The Gaza Genocide

When the Hamas staged the abduction of 253 mainly Israelis on October 7 last year, two schools of sentiments emerged outside the Middle East world: (a) The Non-Western world: Yes, the Palestinians have long been suppressed and they are trying to remind the world of their plight. However, are not they ‘stupid’? How can they fight the Israelis. They are just bringing hardship to their own people again. And (b) the Western world: The Hamas are terrorists; they must be wiped out of Palestine. Period. (A conspiracy theory argues that the Hamas leaders have actually been bought to create an opportunity for Israel to kick out all the Palestinians from Gaza. Anyone willing to buy that?)

But the Israeli reaction defies the most fundamental humanism. The way the Israelis are bombing and killing Palestinians in Gaza is, by any measure, genocidal in essence. Much of the Gaza has been flattened.

It is said that more than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed and 75,000 wounded since October 7. As many as 25,000 of those died are children and women.

It is not difficult to agree that Netanyahu’s sole aim is to drive the Palestinians out and annex Gaza outright. (If he can, he would also want to kick all the Palestinians out of the West Bank and achieve Jews’ millennia dream of having a country that is solely populated by God’s Chosen people, as they see themselves.

I am no admirer of Al Jazeera, but the images they broadcast to the world have enraged those who have a basic sense of human decency. Even Biden has to distance himself from Netanyahu. But he cannot do much, except to appeal to the powerful Jewish lobby in America to help him. Regardless, he continues to send bombs to Israeli.

One positive thing that has come out from the Gaza war: The US has lost its credibility.

Cementing Credibility

China is rewriting the diplomatic protocol. Remember how Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic was treated when he visited Trump? He was made to sit in front of Trump like a young executive facing his CEO for the first time. Biden does no better; he receives heads of states and governments like a Mafia godfather.

Now look at how foreign guests are treated in Beijing. It does not matter whether you are from a tiny republic from the Pacific Islands or from a substantial country, you will get to meet and sit as equal with your Chinese counterparts in one of the tasteful meeting halls in Beijing. Who would not emerge thoroughly sold on this form of treatment? Blinken, who is the de facto foreign minister of the US, certainly has a great deal to learn from Wang Yi. But can he ever learn? American diplomatic arrogance is inborn, which is understandable when it was generally accepted as a force for world good, but that was when the world had too many corrupt and sadistic leaders.

In the wake of America’s hypocrisy in Gaza, and its obvious hand in a fake cause in Ukraine, many countries, including those hitherto supporters of Zelensky, have come to realisation that they now have to change course – politically, economically, and financially. Several leaders are so worried about their country’s economy that they are looking at China as a saviour of the last resort. Some wiser leaders like MBS of Saudi Arabia and in BRICS are rushing to de-dollarize, for they know it is a matter of time the US Dollar will be used as a weapon against them, or their economy continued to be harvested by the US with their Dollar printing machines.

The Tinkerer Rises Again

I described 6 September 2023 as a day that is worthy of commemoration in China. It was the day when Huawei returned to the mobile world with Mate 60 Pro launch – when Gina Raimondo was in town. I termed it in one of my blogs as China’s Breakthrough Day. Against all the sanctions and bans by the US and its allies, Huawei was able to come up with a chip that was for all intents and purposes 7nm. Raimondo has come up with more sanctions and bans, but China’s progress in this front is simply unstoppable.

Traditionally, Chinese as a culture thrives greatly as engineering and technology tinkerers, rather than Newtonian of empirical researchers, or Einstein type of fundamental science theorists. They were happy to occupy a niche for themselves – turning concepts and ideas into goods for the masses. The world was happy to be flooded with cheap and reasonably priced products from China – dresses, shoes, white goods, festive decorations, and what-have-you. Trump woke Chinese up with his trade war and Biden propelled their determination. Within five years, the landscape has been totally reshaped. Today, perhaps a thrid of those involved in science and technology in the world is ethnically Chinese.

Today, not only its EV cars are flooding the market, but China is also the undisputed leader in the field today. Ditto its drones.

Needless for me to say that the Chinese missile technology has surpassed the US. Dare the US ply their aircraft carrier groups in the South and East China Sea when war actually breaks out there. I honestly doubt. (For all my misgivings about South China Morning Post and its Yellow Banana attitudes, I do count on it to follow the most up-to-date information on China’s military and space technology.)

If this is not EXCEPTIONAISM, what is?

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POST SCRIPT

Corrections/Conerns from friends:

(1) 14 April:
From a certain Prof Soon of Melbourne:

... At a personal level, I still feel a significant disparity between China's modernisation and people's behaviours. Bullying attitude of little Napoleons, breaking rules for personal convenience, glorifying slogans without true actions, lack of accountability and transparency etc, will eventually erode the confidence and trust among the people and in their government. Century old habits of feudalism are still prevalent where people with greater authority and money tend to look down or bully the lower strata of society. 

My response: 

Indeed, I have been quite turned off by many things I see in China all this while. I often did China-bashing in my earlier postings. The behaviours of many mainland Chinese are quite obnoxious – too loud, too showy, quite inconsiderate, poor table etiquette, etc. Many are also very unscrupulous, and their risk-appetite drives them to commit appalling crimes. They still have a great deal to learn from the West and Japanese in these areas. Be that as it may, I believe the present leadership has the necessary wisdom and foresight; China should be a “softer” country in due course. Just my hope!

(2) 15 April
From a certain Dato Dr Yeang of Kuala Lumpur
"You said that when the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was bombed, the US "did not bother to offer a decent apology". The US did apologize. In fact, it was Jiang Zemin who refused phone calls from Clinton for a week after the incident before finally accepting a 30-minute apology call. The US paid China millions in compensation. One story I heard was that the Belgrade defence managed to shoot down a US stealth fighter using clever tactics. The Chinese were just beginning to develop their own stealth planes at that time. When some of the parts of the down US plane were gathered by the Chinese and stored in the embassy basement, the US was determined to dstroy the cache. Some people believe that the Chinese reverse-engineered to achieve their own J20 fighter."