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| Professor Kishore Mahbubani was ranked on Foreign Policy magazine's list of the world's top 100 thinkers. He believes China is losing the diplomatic plot at a time when it needs it most. -- ST PHOTO: DESMOND FOO |
Jul 27, 2012
Straits Times (Singapore)
For the first time in 45 years, the Asean Ministerial Meeting (AMM) failed to agree to a joint communique, ostensibly because Asean's current chair, Cambodia, did not want the communique to refer to bilateral disputes in the South China Sea. But the whole world, including most Asean countries, perceived Cambodia's stance as the result of enormous Chinese pressure.
SINGAPORE - In 2016, China's share of the global economy will be larger than America's in purchasing-price-parity terms. This is an earth-shaking development; in 1980, when the United States accounted for 25% of world output, China's share of the global economy was only 2.2%. And yet, after 30 years of geopolitical competence, the Chinese seem to be on the verge of losing it just when they need it most.
China's leaders would be naive and foolish to bank on their country's peaceful and quiet rise to global preeminence. At some point, America will awaken from its geopolitical slumber; there are already signs that it has opened one eye.
But China has begun to make serious mistakes. After Japan acceded to Chinese pressure and released a captured Chinese trawler in September 2010, China went overboard and demanded an apology from Japan, rattling the Japanese establishment.
Similarly, after North Korean shells killed innocent South Korean civilians in November 2010, China remained essentially silent. In a carefully calibrated response, South Korea sent its ambassador to attend the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony for the imprisoned Chinese human-rights activist Liu Xiaobo in December 2010.
China has also ruffled many Indian feathers by arbitrarily denying visas to senior officials. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao subsequently calmed the waters in meetings with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, but such unnecessary provocations left a residue of mistrust in India.
But all of these mistakes pale in comparison with what China did to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in July. For the first time in 45 years, the Asean Ministerial Meeting (AMM) failed to agree to a joint communique, ostensibly because Asean's current chair, Cambodia, did not want the communique to refer to bilateral disputes in the South China Sea. But the whole world, including most Asean countries, perceived Cambodia's stance as the result of enormous Chinese pressure.
China's victory proved to be Pyrrhic. It won the battle of the comminique, but it may have lost 20 years of painstakingly accumulated goodwill, the result of efforts such as the Asean-China free-trade agreement, signed in November 2002. More importantly, China's previous leaders had calculated that a strong and unified Asean provided a valuable buffer against any possible US containment strategy. Now, by dividing Asean, China has provided America with its best possible geopolitical opportunity in the region. If Deng Xiaoping were alive, he would be deeply concerned.
It may be unfair to blame China's leaders for the Asean debacle. More likely than not, over-zealous junior officials pushed a hard line on the South China Sea, whereas no Chinese leader, if given the choice, would have opted to wreck the AMM Communique. But the fact that it happened reveals the scope of China's recent poor decision-making.
The 'nine-dotted line' that China has drawn over the South China Sea may prove to be nothing but a big geopolitical millstone around China's neck. It was unwise to attach the map in a note verbale responding to a joint submission by Vietnam and Malaysia to the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in May 2009. This was the first time that China had included the map in an official communication to the UN, and it caused great concern among some Asean members.
The geopolitical opportunity implied by inclusion of the map has not been lost on America, which is why the US, somewhat unusually, has made another effort to ratify the Law of the Sea Convention. Having tabled the nine-dotted line at the UN, China walked into a no-win situation, owing to the difficulty of defending the map under international law. Indeed, as the eminent historian Wang Gungwu has pointed out, the first maps to claim the South China Sea were Japanese, and were inherited by Nationalist China.
Domestically, too, the nine-dotted line may cause problems for the government by presenting critics with a useful weapon. Any hint of compromise will expose officials politically. In other words, a few rocks in the South China Sea have put China between a rock and a hard place.
There is no doubt that China will have to find a way to compromise over the nine-dotted line. In private, it has begun to do so. Even though the line covers the waters northeast of the Indonesian-owned Natuna Islands, the Chinese government has given Indonesia categorical assurances that China does not claim the Natuna Islands or their Exclusive Economic Zone.
These private assurances calmed relations with Indonesia. So why not make similar overtures to other Asean states?
The legacies of Deng and his predecessor, Mao Zedong, are very different. But the People's Republic's two most important leaders did agree in one area: both bent over backwards to make territorial concessions to resolve border disputes. This explains why China was so generous to Russia, for example, in its border settlements.
Mao and Deng could do this because both provided China with strong leadership. The challenge for the world now is that China has become politically pluralistic: no leader is strong enough to make wise unilateral concessions.
Nothing will happen in China until the leadership transition is completed in November. The new administration of Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang will need some time to settle in. But America is waking up. So, too, will the rest of the world in 2016. The big question then will be: Is China as geopolitically competent as number one as it was when it was number two?
Kishore Mahbubani is Dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore and author of the forthcoming book The Great Convergence: Asia, the West, and the Logic of One World.
11 comments:
why everybody sounded so against china? this professor looks indian, i wouldn't be surprised if he has any bias toward china as well. china is one of the superpower, why people seemed so against china? china is fast becoming the world second economy now, and china has changed and reformed over the past years, so why bash china like this. the issue of the south china sea is no different from preah vihear issue, from koh tral issue, etc, just different location, but same dispute issue, really. stop bashing china for a change, really. i think china is getting better and better all the time, i wouldn't be surprise either if china is becoming the world richest nation, you know. i think it is a good idea for other superpower nations to partner for cooperation with china, you know; that's beneficial to mankind, i think. and china is also here to stay, so why continue to bash china like this? china is china, there's nothing you can do to change china to something else. why be so bitter about china?
2:45 PM
Kishore Mahbubani is Singaporean of Indian origin. He sided with Hanoi, and since US is now working with Hanoi, his job is to write bashing China. He got paid a lot for this article. It is Kishore's propaganda. That is how he makes money. His words are valuable because he is a Scholar. Scholars are some corrupt too, you know, because money is the source of making men feel good.
Not only Kishore is a scholar but he is an Academan and a former UN Diplomat, people respect him. Kishore is Indian lives in Singapore.
UN has often failed their duties such as in Cambodia, so Kishore is no fortune teller.
The UN failed miserably to disarm Yuon/Hun Sen when Rannaridh won.
It is just Kishore's analysis.
Just to share with you folks that Vietnam has launched it propaganda through out South East Asia to India. Vietnam got support mainly from Muslim and Hindu nations. Indonesia and Malaysia have their own interest. Indonesia and Malaysia hate Chinese in their countries, they are afraid that more and more Chinese their countries, they may becoming a minority group. that is why these two countries support Vietnam and insisted that Cambodia and Lao should be part of Vietnamese new Federation.
You see now Vietnam won Philippines on its side because of South China Sea territory.
The US has one plan is to kcik China out from its influence zone, so the US needs Vietnam who has a giant military among top 10 in the world.
Cambodia has no game to play because every angle we see was all engineered by Hanoi. Billion of dollars Hun Sen the puppet got it is going to feed a giant army of Vietnam. Vietnam drains economy from Laos and Cambodia every day to feed itself. Not even that Indonesia helps behind Vietnam such as deforestation and many more.
Cambodia needs China as always and China has to often smack Vietnam for its aggression against Cambodia and Laos.
Now you see Russia is coming? Russia is the same as Soviet Union that supports Vietnam to destroy Cambodia.
More to come.../
i think overall, people in asia are brainwashed to be biased in something they instill fear into. they often fail to see the ethics and the professionalism related to that. and i'm not just saying in cambodia, i mean everywhere in asia, people are biased. you can tell by the way they talk to you, the way they interact with each other, etc, etc... they all have to take side, if not, they blame each other, that's just the asian way, i guess. they is the reason why most people are attracted to america, the best kind of gov't in the world. it is true, just observe it everywhere you go. in america, people use ethics, professionalism, etc, in asia, it's more like class status, taking side, economic disparity, etc, etc that give you your status, your power, your privilege, etc, etc... and just don't blame cambodia about this, it's existed everywhere in any country and with any group of people, race, etc in asia over all, it's they way of life there, really! that is why i often advise america not to take side with any sone of those asian people, they all are the same behavior, the asian behavior, that is, you know. like vietnam and the philipines with the south china issue, they all tried to get america to take their side against their dispute with china, then they tried to lobby other asian gov't to do the same by taking side with them, when in fact or in reality, even those countries like vietnam, philipines, thailand, etc have their own issues. take preah vihear for example, koh tral island issue between vietnam and cambodia, etc, etc... people seemed to overlooked these other issues and only concentrated on the south china sea issue because it involved china in the dispute. other dispute also similare to the south china sea like cambodia's koh tral island and cambodia's preah vihear, people look at it as bilateral issue, but with china isn't something, the problem here is very inconsistent, you know; no wonder asean did not show unity, etc, it's because of this inconsistency in the way people treated cambodia while treating others like the philipines, thailand and vietnam, etc as more superior to cambodia. so that's why i say china is the most superior of them all because china is really a superpower while vietnam, the pilipines, thailand, etc is not, really! so don't try to be the superpower like china, like america, like russia, etc when you are not, ok! it's not going to work in asia, let alone with cambodia, you know. perhaps, next times asean, etc should be more consistent with the cambodia issue as well so we would not have this kind of problem again, ok! if not, then don't expect much from asean in terms of unity or whatever, ok! i think asean was created as a bloc against communism in the beginning, when in this day and ages, communism countries are getting blurrier and probably soon ceased to exist as a threatening force anywhere, so asean, etc had to change their view or their role as well, you know. just because something your created in the beginning to contain something else, doesn't necessarily mean you have to be that way forever, you have to look at time and see changes and then change or adjust your way with time, really. otherwise, you miss the whole point in all this, really!
the way i see it, people fail to see and understand that china is a changing country, so stop that bias, discrimination or prejudice against china being a gian communist country or whatever. china is here to stay, get used to it; and china's economy is fast become the second economy in the world, so what is so communist about that? in past it was different, nowadays, i think china is also different in a good way. if people play politics like big fish eat small fish or whatever, then they fail completely to see or understand that difference between human being and the real animal world. we, humans, just don't do that sort of thing like eating each other like in the wild of the animals world, really. so why try to go there? wake up people, everyone of us can use a good education, really. and what is education anyway? education for one is supposed to make us humans understand each other's differences, etc... so be aware of that, ok! this is how cambodia feel all along about the small fish eats by the big fish, etc... very inconsistent and should not be this way with the human world, really! the rule of law is always better for the human world, you know, i don't care what other are saying, but i cannot imagine the human world without some sort of the rule of law, it's probably worst than chaos. didn't people learn from cambodia's killing fields because that was a good example of the human world without the understand and the use of the rule of law, you have abuse, you have killings, you have no justice, you have nothing left to talk about, ok. wake up people, embrace the rule of law, code of ethical conduct, professional conduct, etc, etc, ok! that's how we, humans, deal with one another; the bias, the ignorance, the prejudice, the discrimination and all that stupid, primitive way won't help at all, so why go there? think about it, ok! i don't care who you are. it's wake up time, ok!
the chinese are so brian washed by their governement propoganda machine they cannot see the truth, no one in the world support their nine dash line, no where in the world any one country claims an entire sea for itself, no even the us to claim the gulf of mexico for itself nor the body of water by its coast. the reason the chinese are looked down by all countries is because they don't act like they deserve a superpower status, they are lucky the white men gave them a UN veto power which came with responsibility to uphold the UN laws, on the other hand they break the very UN UNCLOS which they signed and they are breaking it. Not only is this law saying that every country has a 200 nautical miles exclusive economic zone for itself, and you must change your constitution to conform to that law...reality is that chinese fishermen are infringing on their neighbors 200 EEC every single day and they are tactically backed by their navies. how can the world not look down on the chinese? stating the truth hurts so they are feeling being bashed. no one will criticize your bad behavior your actions are not unbecoming. you claim historical rights to the islands which have no basis since your maps from the 1500s are not showing those islands whereas vietnam got 60-70 foreign maps that clearly showed those islands belonging to it since the 1500s. your claims have very credibility.
Here is a little bit of information on UN laws of ownership. For any country to claim the islands, they must have people or troops occupying those islands continuously. So it you desert the place, it become unoccupied land, and the next finder become the keeper. Chinese map may have mentioned those islands like in the 1st century but they never have their people living there. Those islands might be a refuge for shipwrecks, but they never had a colony or such there. Claiming historical rights is never taken seriously by the UN because almost everybody can state he owns it and may fabricate proof of such. What's important is who's the last occupier there. Vietnam did have people living and stationed their troops on both the Spartly and Paracel islands until China invaded the whole Paracel and part of the Spartly island. If the matter is bring up in the UN, the Chinese will lose 101%. The countries of the world know that, but because of Chinese influence and not to want to make the problem bigger, they don't take side. However, the people of the world knows that the Chinese claim is a joke.
The author is very compontent. He said "... China has become politically pluralistic: no leader is strong enough to make wise unilateral concessions"
This is a very valid assessment of China. The world were confused when China said one way and act another way on many occasions. The Chinese government is deeply divided and the next leadership line seem equally weak or strong for that matter, which is troublesome for China diplomatic corps. Who is the next Deng Xiaoping?
to me, i think china is only trying to make a point. take the issue in cambodia (since cambodia is chair this year), in the past, one often hear how cambodia have no chance against vietnam or thailand with our issues like preah vihear and koh tral island because some people would argue that the big fish eats the small fish or what have you. so in this case, let see how this concept is put into play outside of cambodia, in case this china will eat all the little fish. that is exactly how we cambodian feel all along when we have to deal with vietnam and thailand for their violence with cambodia sovereignty, etc, etc, you know. well, now, how do one say about that with china compare to how one say about cambodia. i think the bottom line is china is proving a point that you just don't use the animal instinct in the name of big eat small or whatever, it's doesn't ring the bell with human. yes, cambodia have been there before with thailand and vietnam. how do you say about that? can't say cambodia had in the past incompetent leaders or whatever because that's like taking advantage of a weaker state by a bigger state. thus, you can't complain about china, you see how the concept of what goes around comes around. well, it is so true in karma. so stop whining about china, people don't want to hear about it, really! and what make vietnam and the philipines more special than cambodia in this situation? not you know cambodia by your education? cambodia may be small, but we will bit back like a badger, you know. so stop ignoring cambodia and biased against cambodia, ok! china entitles to every bit of it, really. don't whine when you chose to ignore my country cambodia, ok! sometimes, a small problem help solve a bigger problem, so don't ignore the smaller problem, ok.
so, what you are sayin is in order to claim a land or island or what have, you all you have to do is send your felons there to occupy, then it's yours? i think the viet/youn might be learn from french, british or some othe european empire of the past. let's see, if that's not like taking advantage of other country, then we go going back to the big fish eats the small fish argument again. then in this case, china is winning, case closed! and i don't agree with your outdated, primitive rule of sending your felons to colony somebody's else territories, lands, islands, waters, etc, really! is that's why the viet/youn did that to cambodia's koh tral island and the siem is try to do that to cambodia's preah vihear, you see, we cannot get along, really! more power to china, absolutely!
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