{30/09/99

The editors

SCMP/Newsweek

Sirs,

Gerald Segal’s jealous bitching (South China Morning Post, 14 September 1999; Newsweek, September 1999) was to be expected-- after China punctured the Brit’s colonial ego over Hong Kong without having to fire a single shot. His observation of old China’s demise should have given him a sign of where the country he calls home is heading, now that it has been through more than half a century of relative decline.

Lucky for China, it is on its way up again. China’s progress is particularly rapid in the past twenty years after it had discarded the Western shackle of communism for a dose of oriental common sense. Its success is proved even by many “dubious” Western statistics of the Seagull [sic] type, which managed to show that, after being the fastest growing economy in the world for the past two decades, China ended up having a lower share of the world economy than when the reform started. Common sense can again give a truer picture.

Not only that, the trade and investment statistics quoted by Segal himself show how little China depends on the input from the rest of the world, and from the west in particular, in order to thrive. The contrast is made even more revealing when China is compared with the “gross failure” of the British system next-door, which Segalpretends not to notice, or the former Soviet Union (and its legacy Russia), which managed to pressed its self-destruct button by submitting to the dictates of the West. Of course, any person with half a brain would not trust in statistics the way Segal does- whether of Chinese or Western origin. A serious and thoughtful scholar would trust his own eyes and judgement by comparing the actual material and psychological well-being between the past and the present, and between examples inside and outside China. Segal obvious has not undertaken any study of this kind. Bird-brain analysis leads him to spurt out “useless” propaganda fit only for showing in the “free press” which, no doubt, will censor this letter.

Western ideologies of whatever kind are not to be trusted. More proofs of this dictum can be found during the recent recession of the Asian economies. Those who had succumbed to Western dictates (e.g. South Korean and Indonesia) lost their pants as well as their sovereignty, while those who defied them (e.g. Malaysia, Hong Kong and Singapore) kept their rice bowls as well as their dignity. Mainland China, which actually banned Western predatory capital, came out the least affected.

Segal is nevertheless correct in saying that China’s military spending is very low and, therefore, cannot constitute a predatory “first-rate” military power. This only serves to debunk Western propaganda, which constantly slanders China as a threat. Some people in his own camp will not be pleased.

What irks him even more is the fact that, despite his obvious displeasure and jealousy, the whole world pays attention to China rather than to the ex-Great Britain, which has now degenerated to being a spineless lackey of the global bully-man. Low military spending will not handicap national defense. He only has to recall those very interesting examples when “first-rate” white powers attempted to subjugate nth-class Asian powers in Vietnam and Afghanistan. All it needs is that that country’s people have enough backbone to allow it to stand up to such superpower thuggery and thereby wins victory and earns respect. Segal’s home country also proves this truth by being the negative example.

Chinese ghosts of the nineteenth century ought to feel vindicated and can now rest in peace. While their own descendants have utterly rejected the Ah-Q spirit of theirs, the proud citizens of the once-great Britain is now adopting this mentality as their national character.

Sincerely,

**Censored by "The Free Press", Refused publication**}