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
Read the article: Trump said that’s what Xi said. Trump did not say it was true.
I have hopes for a resurgent Mongol Empire, including burning the Middle East down. LOL.
Thank you.
You’ve proven part of present day N Korea was a foreign land occupied by Chinese forces.
All these events were before there ever was a Korea. Korea has never been part of China.
Suzerainty does not make the other state part of the suzerain state.
See this for some specifics on dynastic China
Historically, the Emperor of China saw himself as the centre of the entire civilized world, and diplomatic relations in East Asia were based on the theory that all rulers of the world derived their authority from the Emperor. The degree to which this authority existed in fact changed from dynasty to dynasty. However, even during periods when political power was distributed evenly across several political entities, Chinese political theory recognized only one emperor and asserted that his authority was paramount throughout the world. Diplomatic relations with the Chinese emperor were made on the theory of tributary states, although in practice tributary relations would often result in a form of trade under the theory that the emperor in his kindness would reward the tributary state with gifts of equal or greater value.
This system broke down in the 18th and 19th centuries in two ways. First during the 17th century, China was ruled by the ethnically Manchu Qing dynasty which ruled a multi-ethnic empire and justified their rule through different theories of rulership. While not contradicting traditional Han Chinese theories of the emperor as universal ruler, the Qing did begin to make a distinction between areas of the world which they ruled and areas which they did not. The system also broke down as China faced European powers whose theories of sovereignty were based on international law and relations between separate states.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzerainty
So, just a Chankoro thinker?
You’re gonna need more Mongols.
I don’t know if China ever owned Korea, but Japan (Japanese Empire) did for roughly 70 years from the 1870’s to 1945!
“All these events were before there ever was a Korea.”
There were -
- Koreans, these are an ancient, distinct people with a unique language and culture.
- The land now known as Korea, those mountains and valleys, towns and villages.
Both were at various times and in various parts, under Chinese Imperial rule, direct and indirect. That the various states and territories they were in were not called “Korea” is neither here nor there.
There was no “India” when the British conquered the place, they took Bengal, Madras, Hyderabad, etc. “India” was merely a geographical expression that covered much of Asia.
Tributary states are by definition not part of the state they give tribute to.
By the logic Korea was part of China, the same way a business is when the mafia collects “protection money”
See this for various states that gave tribute to various Chinese dynasties
Were they part of China? No.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tributaries_of_Imperial_China
Not 1870- roughly either 1895 or 1905 or 1910, depending on the interpretation.
China claims that just about everything around them “used to be part of China.” They claim it about Tibet when the exact opposite is true. Tibet used to rule most of what is now China.
Were the Indian princely states, such as Hyderabad and Kashmir (tributaries of the British Viceroyality) parts of India?
In law, or as a political fact? The Nizam of Hyderabad misunderstood the relationship in 1948, and was corrected.
There is still controversy over Kashmir.
“By the logic Korea was part of China, the same way a business is when the mafia collects “protection money”
So this is different from what else in history?
Examine the history of Britain, of France, of Spain, of Italy, and you will see the same thing, over and over.
You don’t understand logic.
It does not make Korea part of China because certain Korean dynastic families paid tribute to certain Han families hundreds or thousands of years ago.
This is ChiCom logic.
They took over Tibet based on this logic (because Tibet was easy to take over).
When Xi says this he is saying China still has suzerainty over Korea.
>Tributary states are by definition not part of the state they give tribute to.
>By the logic Korea was part of China, the same way a business is when the mafia collects “protection money”
2 different Chinese empires directly incorporated Korea into the empire. They were part of China.
No.
It was never anything more than suzerainty.
But, let’s say you were right.
What relevance is it?
“They took over Tibet based on this logic”
No, they merely justified their takeover with this logic.
There is no law in any of this, merely power.
“When Xi says this he is saying China still has suzerainty over Korea.”
Yes, exactly. That will be his, and their, argument if they do end up squeezing either North Korea or South Korea.
It depends on what “China” one refers to.
Remember — China was ruled by several dynasties, one overthrowing the other.
For 70 years China was ruled by the Mongols under Genghis Khan, Kublai Khan and their descendants. The Chinese called this “Yuan Chao” ( The Yuan Dynasty ).
So, was China undr the Yuan Dynasty, China then ? Or do we consider Mongol ruled China, not China?
For about 50 years after Mongols subdued Goryeo kingdom. This is subjective because Korea did still have nominal king and he did have absolute authority on Korean peninsula - but this king was almost more a part of Yuan court than an independent king - they were all married into Yuan imperial princesses and even grew up in Yuan court in many cases.
Mongols of course aren’t exactly Chinese (90% of Chinese are of the Han race), so that’s why it’s subjective, if you’re a Chinese person of Mongol descent then the answer is a yes, sort of.
At no time, prior to 1949, did China (any China) have any type of rule over Tibet. They of course say differently.
Regardless, Trump should not have said it.
If the Chinese were not the source providing the idea, saying it shows ignorance. If it was, it wrongly - again out of ignorance, accepting Chinese propaganda.
Many of the emperors of China for centuries operated China’s form of imperialism.
China had massive human, military, resource and economic advantages over many of its neighbors. All it had to do was threaten all of that would be employed at the emperor’s disposal, unless a foreign ruler made concessions to China. The basic one was acceptance by the foreign ruler that they were “junior” and subordinate to the emperor of China, and for that “privilege” had to pay tribute to the Chinese emperor.
The historical reference to this condition was suzerainty, and the nation accepting it was a “vassal” state. The Chinese considered such states as “part of China”. The official historical descriptions say this condition only applied to the international affairs of the vassal state. That it not true. Chinese emperors frequently sought (and often succeeded) in blocking things that were relevant only to the vassal state’s domestic affairs. The Koreans, having been subject to that under multiple Chinese emperors, know that history well.
“History and geography are not his strong suits.”
The Tang dynasty at one time held much of Korea although the fighting was pretty continuous.
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