Posted on 04/21/2017 10:07:58 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
In fairness to Trump, he heard that directly from China’s president (or so he says). What was he supposed to do, be skeptical of Chinese nationalist propaganda?
If you can’t trust Xi Jinping to shoot straight with you about a western-allied country within China’s sphere of influence, who can you trust?
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal last week, Trump said Xi told him during a recent summit that “Korea actually used to be a part of China.” The comments sparked outrage in Seoul and became an issue in South Korea’s presidential race, prompting the foreign ministry to seek to verify what Xi actually said.
“It’s a clear fact acknowledged by the international community that, for thousands of years in history, Korea has never been part of China,” foreign ministry spokesman Cho June-hyuck said at a briefing in Seoul on Thursday…
“This is clearly a distortion of history and an invasion of the Republic of Korea’s sovereignty,” conservative Liberty Korea Party candidate Hong Joon-pyo said through a spokesman.
Politically, that’s a bit like idly observing that Crimea contains a lot of ethnic Russians. An alarming possibility, though: Maybe Xi didn’t say that to him. Maybe Trump simply misunderstood, and now, because he seems not to realize which details he should and shouldn’t share publicly about his discussions with China’s leader, South Korea’s leadership is left to wonder erroneously whether Beijing is planning to include them in its “one China” plans a few decades from now. More from the Telegraph:
“I suspect that Mr Xi said, in effect, that Korea was part of China because it was overwhelmingly under Chinese influence historically and Mr Trump bought that,” said Rah Jong-yil, a former South Korean ambassador to both London and Tokyo.
“It shows his shocking ignorance of the situation in north-east Asia,” he told The Telegraph. “That is very disturbing to us”…
There is a growing body of nationalist thought in China that ancient Korean kingdoms were part of the Chinese empire and that modern-day nation states should similarly fall within Beijing’s exclusive sphere of influence, Mr Rah said.
If the South Koreans had any sort of troll game at all, they would have responded by claiming that Mexico’s president recently reminded them that the U.S. used to be part of Mexico. That would have been an amusing phone call between Trump and Pena Nieto.
As a Twitter pal said, what would make this even more darkly funny is if Trump started reminding everyone that China used to be a part of Japan. Does he really have no sense of the nationalist sensitivities in the region or how nervous U.S. allies there are about China’s growing power, especially after the White House ditched TPP? His tough talk towards China as a candidate might have reassured them but it’s been nothing but sunshine with Beijing since that phone call with Taiwan’s president. What looked like a looming “U.S. and Russia isolate China” long-term play by the White House during the transition increasingly looks more like a “U.S. and China isolate Russia” strategy. (Neither is likely to work, but still.) Imagine watching that play out in Tokyo or Seoul and suddenly finding Trump repeating Chinese talking points about the Korean peninsula.
Ah well. So long as he has an “armada” in the vicinity to help protect South Korea from the menace to the north, they’ll forgive him. Once they’re done forgiving him for BSing them about that armada, that is.
South Korea dismisses #Trump's remark that Korea was "part of China." pic.twitter.com/DtHa4gOSHe
— Jeffrey Guterman (@JeffreyGuterman) April 20, 2017
Look commie, you’re exposed.
Oh boy. Do we want our children to repeat Trump’s vulgarity? Will Ted Cruz pull his endorsement of Trump?
Sorry some may have been confused by the title “Dear Leader’s Gaffes”, thinking you meant Trump.
You talking about Obama’s gaffes? Correct?
http://www.dividedstates.com/list-of-obama-gaffes-blunders-mistakes-and-stupidities/
Here are links to some of them:
Obama talking about bowling a 129. That was Obama on the Tonight Show with Leno.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HOBTUCv4o0
The ‘Intercontinental Railroad’ comment was Obama.
http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/tom-blumer/2011/09/23/was-obamas-intercontinental-railroad-reference-lifted-previous
The 10,000 died in Kansas in also Obama.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-gaffe-10000-died-in-kan-tornado/
“was part of China.”
Now we are arguing words and nuances beyond utility in the current controversy.
That is a bit of legal-contract pettifoggery.
Its a bit like arguing that Hungary was not part of Austria in 1796. Well, yes, technically and legally it was because the Emperor was King of Hungary (the Dual monarchy, Kaiserlich und Koniglich, his authority was Imperial and Royal) and Hungary was a different country under a separate sovereign authority.
However, the Emperor marched his armies through Hungary and collected taxes and levied troops and controlled its foreign policy. As did China (usually) in Korea.
Close your ears and say “nananana”.
The only way to deal, as a conservative, in this world is to look facts in the face.
The Chinese government is a totalitarian dictatorship that is perfectly amoral and can’t be trusted any more than any given Democrat.
But facts are facts in any case, even if you hear them from the Devil.
According to a fellow officer of Korean descent with whom I work, China did conquer Korea at some point in its history. Probably what Xi (and by extension Trump) was referring to. He wasn’t happy with Trump’s statement at all, but he grudgingly admitted as much to me.
China was part of Japan too.
Knock off your ChiCom propaganda.
Many points in its history.
[[You talking about Obama’s gaffes? Correct?]]
Yes
Nice try.
Was Germany part of the United States?
Indeed, for a few years under the Shogun Hideyoshi after 1592 and forty years or so, effectively, after the Russo-Japanese war.
That doesn’t change anything about Xi’s facts. He can recite facts without reciting other facts.
I am not reciting propaganda. This is all real and can be researched and its useful as a guide as to how ALL Chinese governments (not just ChiComs) regarded Korea, and as a guide to Korean attitudes towards China (and Japan). Arm yourself with knowledge!
You think like a ChiCom.
Twisted backward logic, non-understanding of modern nation states vs former dynastic rule.
And double standard inconsistencies where you would argue Korea was part of China but would never admit China was, by the same logic, part of Japan.
Korea was never part of China and your own posts prove it.
The parts under US occupation?
What is the meaning of “part”?
Back in the Cold War, for a while there even Konrad Adenauer said West Germany was a client state of the US.
Is Guam a part of the United States? I’m guessing you would say yes.
Was it a part of the United States the day the US Navy imposed a military governor on this conquered territory in 1898?
These are all complicated, fuzzy concepts.
Yep. The northern part of Korea was part of the Han dynasty.
Just more msm Trump trolling.
But for the US, South Korea would be starving along with the north.
A carping ally and lying MSM. Imagine that.
You have Chankoro logic
Exactly. All the above cases demonstrate identical morons fighting it out for idiot-based reasons.
“These are all complicated, fuzzy concepts.”
Except when it becomes something your beloved Chinese Communist Party claims.
Then it’s clear as a bell to you.
“non-understanding of modern nation states vs former dynastic rule.”
You have nation-states under dynastic rule - England under the Tudors, Stuarts, Hanover. Bourbon France. And non-dynastic rule in old feudal states like Poland. And in the three cases above, all had aspects of one and aspects of the other. Highly recommended for a truly deep dive into the nature of a European traditional state, Hippolyte Taine, “France under the Old Regime”.
There is no such thing as this, precisely, vs that, clearly different. No clear lines or uncomplicated categories. We are discussing human societies, that most messy of things.
To make it clear, my most direct contact with Communists was in the early 1980’s, when I was a “guest” of theirs for a few days of the Philippine New Peoples Army (Maoist). They thought I was suspicious while travelling in the provinces.
Black and white thinkers, that lot.
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