Posted on 09/25/2004 11:13:47 AM PDT by wagglebee
In 1938 Winston Churchill was about as unknown in the democratic West as is Howard Phillips today. Among those who knew Churchill the consensus was that he was a comical fatso, maniacal or evil enough to assert that Hitler, who had set forth, in cooperation with England and France, “peace for our time,” was (oh, God, you’ll die laughing!) preparing a war for world domination!
Lloyd George, whom my Encyclopedia Britannica introduces as one of the greatest statesmen in British history, said that he would be happy if such a great man as Hitler were at the head of the British government. Even Churchill’s son, a journalist, sent Hitler congratulations after his party received a plurality of votes in the Reichstag and he became Reichschancellor (prime minister) of Germany.
When British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain brought home a scrap of paper signed by Hitler, “the vast majority of the British people” (as the British cliche goes) went crazy with joy, and Chamberlain could barely ride through the human sea flooding London. A newsreel camera caught King Edward VIII of England giving a Nazi salute during his stay in Germany.
Hitler would have achieved his goal of world domination if he had left this admiration of him intact and concentrated on the development of nuclear weapons instead of starting a conventional war, which absorbed all of Germany’s resources. And before launching the world war, he made another mistake in 1939 that reversed public opinion of him in the democratic West.
The scrap of paper Chamberlain brought from Germany in 1938 that evoked such joy among “the vast majority of the British people” stipulated Hitler’s seizure of the part of Czechoslovakia predominantly populated by ethnic “Germans,” that is, German-speaking Czechs. So the seizure was not considered aggression (just as the “peaceful reunification” of the “People’s Republic of China” with Taiwan will not be regarded as aggression if the United States agrees to it). On the contrary, the democratic West perceived it as an important aspect of “peace for our time.”
But in 1939 Hitler seized “the rump of Czechoslovakia,” i.e., that part of the country NOT populated by German-speaking Czechs.
Public opinion in the democratic West reversed itself. So Hitler WAS an aggressor! Since he had seized the “rump of Czechoslovakia,” which had nothing to do with anything or anyone German, why would he not seize the rest of the world?
Imagine the “People’s Republic of China” first “reunifying itself” with Taiwan under a Sino-American agreement, brought to Washington, D.C., by an American Chamberlain of today and met with universal Western joy. But the following year, the dictatorship of China seizes, say, Mexico, which is NOT populated by Chinese-speaking Mexicans. Western public opinion would change overnight.
The present world-famous statesmen of the democratic West would be dumped on the dunghill of history, as was Chamberlain, and ridiculed, as he was, for their blindness, smugness and childish stupidity. And just as Churchill was, Howard Phillips would be lifted from obscurity to the peak of political glory.
I met Howard Phillips in the 1980s. He was one of those few who appreciated my message about the Soviet and later Chinese development of post-nuclear superweapons to circumvent Mutual Assured Destruction. After China replaced Russia as the key geostrategic threat, those few who sponsored my lectures all over the West and arranged for my appearances in the media dwindled to almost zero. The dictatorship of Russia could be dangerous, in their opinion. But the dictatorship of China? A monstrous absurdity!
What about Phillips?
In contrast to Churchill before 1939, Phillips has a communication medium fit for an individual who, like Churchill before 1939, is in a minority of one against the vast majority of the democratic West. I mean the Internet, of course. The other day I was scanning the entries for “Project 863 in China” in the “Yahoo!” search engine. I found nothing of interest (my own columns on the subject in Yahoo! are of no interest to ME) except news items from the magazine that Phillips publishes, “Issues & Strategy Bulletin.”
Possibly not a single contemporary Western statesman and no Western mainstream media host or guest has devoted to the “China threat” even 5 or 10 seconds in the past year, but the news items of Phillips devoted to the “China threat” occupy hundreds of pages. This is how Churchill would have filled the Internet in 1938, had the Internet existed, with news items about the “German threat,” which would have proved to “the vast majority of the British people” that he was a maniac.
However, while Hitler seized in 1939 “the rump of Czechoslovakia,” the “supreme leaders” of China will never seize, for example, Mexico. Hitler lived in the age of conventional wars for territory. In 1945 that age was over. Japan had seized a vast territory before 1945 but surrendered unconditionally to the (nuclear) superweapons of 1945. The USA could establish world domination because of those superweapons.
Similarly, the owner of the post-nuclear (nano?) superweapons will be able to establish world domination regardless of which side has seized what territory, be it part of Czechoslovakia or Mexico. In 1945 there emerged the new war, the war of labs developing post-nuclear superweapons.
Hence, there is nothing like Hitler’s seizing “the rump of Czechoslovakia” and thus changing Western public opinion. And Phillips will stay in obscurity as Churchill would have, had not Hitler seized “the rump of Czechoslovakia” and begun a conventional war for territory instead of concentrating on the development of nuclear superweapons.
Phillips was the Constitution Party’s presidential nominee in 2000. He had no chance, and he refused to run again for the presidency in 2004. To run would be the same as Churchill trying to become prime minister before Hitler launched his conventional war for territory.
It seems that to run for the U.S. presidency the candidate must be a billionaire, which Phillips is not, as Churchill was not. Who will invest in a presidential candidate who has no chance?
Since today’s war is a war of labs, it is important for “human intelligence” to penetrate the Chinese labs and come up with sensational discoveries able to change Western public opinion. But Ronald Reagan agreed with my Commentary magazine article of 1978 in which I contended that the West has no “human intelligence” vis-a-vis dictatorships, and it took 26 years for the U.S. political establishment to accept this truth.
Therefore, the Chinese war of labs is on, but the West is pleasantly ignorant of it and few would vote for the new Winston Churchill, under the name of Howard Phillips, or contribute financially to his presidential election campaign.
So Chamberlains will be in power in the democratic West, asleep yet facing not a conventional war, but a post-nuclear (nano?) strike, meaning annihilation or, with a bit of luck, unconditional surrender.
China was unprepared for the events of 9/11 or Asia would already look different than it does. I doubt they will be unprepared again.
With regard to the reference to the "reunification" of Taiwan with the mainland:
Taiwan has NEVER been unified with China in the first place. It has always been a separate entity, unto itself.....just as the Malvenas were never a part of Argentina.
Keeping that in mind then China doesn't have a leg to stand on with its talk of "reunification."
Why in the world was Chang-Kai-Shek able to establish a governemnt on Taiwan if it had been part of China in the first place?
-ccm
They are actively buildng their military and there is really no outward threat against them.
China went to war with Vietnam in 1979, in part to back Chinese proxies in Cambodia.
China went to war with India in 1962, seeking territory in the mountains and near the mutual border with Pakistan. China also supports Pakistan by arms, and is the source of Pakistan's nuclear technology.
China went to war with the US and its UN allies in 1950 to keep control of its Manchurian border in the hands of its North Korean proxy. It continues to support NK with trade and arms cooperation. NK is aggressively pursuing nuclear weapons and is a state sponsor of terrorism.
China cooperated with Libya's nuclear program, with Iraq, with Iran, and with Syria. Chinese are also in the Sudan, where they have major oil concessions. They are major arms suppliers to the thugs murdering people in Darfur.
Since 1989, China has sought to create a blue water navy and has advanced claims to the south China sea and islands within it. Most of this build up is obviously directed at Taiwan. They have been willing to harass US aircraft in the SCS, and have had skirmishes with Philippine and other navies in the area.
Official Chinese military doctrine is based on the idea of "assymmetric warfare". This stresses avoiding open confrontation with the US, while pursuing unconventional and proxy attacks on their enemies. This includes third party terrorist attacks, guerilla war in third countries, proxy war, etc. China is a leading proliferator of advanced weapons systems and of nuclear technologies.
These are not the actions or policies of a peaceful or status quo power. China sees its economy growing at 7% annual rates and expects to close the gap between its GDP and that of the US, at least by half, in a few decades. It expects to surpass Japan within the same period. It expects to be the major power in eastern Asia and a serious geopolitical actor well beyond, from east Africa and the middle east through central and southeast Asia, around the Pacific rim.
These ambitions may be delusional or not in China's best interests. Tyrants often miscalculate, overreach, and do generally stupid things. But they are the current active policies of the Chinese state. You stereotyped projections based on ancient history do not set Chinese policies. They are set by unaccountable, falliable human beings now and in the near future.
You misunderstand Chinese history completely. The notion of China, having its present historical boundaries, is a modern notion. China is the most successful empire in the history of the world. The state of Chin, from which "China" is derived, was a small state in the northwest of modern China. Over time, the Han Chinese people conquered and annexed the territory that used to belong to other peoples. These elements were submerged into the Han Chinese, and forced to speak Chinese. That's why there are so many "dialects" of Chinese--the dialects began as foreign pronunciations of Mandarin. Wherever China has a border, China has territorial ambitions. For much of its history, Vietnam was a Chinese province. For a few hundred years, so was Korea. China's long-term plan is to "assimilate" Tibet, and then also Vietnam and Korea, as well as Mongolia.
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