National Defense University Forum

China’s National Defense University (国防大学) held a conference on October 15 to discuss how to implement the military’s ability to cope with a variety of security threats and how to implement the diversification of the military’s ability to meet its tasks, in accordance with Chairman Hu’s strategic thoughts.

The conference received a total of more than 300 papers from leading military organs, forces, institutes, and scientific research institutions. (…) Sixteen comrades made keynote speeches.

Deputy Chief of Staff Zhang Li (张黎), the National Defense University’s director Wang Xibin (王喜斌) and political commissioner Tong Shiping (童世平) attended the conference.

Related: Navy Political Commanders: Top Level Changes (July 18).

Taiwan’s Premier wants to “Stand his Ground”

Taiwan’s premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) says that the government won’t remove the Republic-of-China flags when Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, arrives in Taiwan on October 31. Taiwan Solidarity Union Chairman Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝) said on Thursday he had heard from reliable sources that China had requested that no ROC flags be displayed at places Chen would visit.

It is unlikely however that the distinguished guest from the other side of the other side of the Strait will object to pictures of Sun Yat-sen.

Meantime, according to the China Post, a DPP source says predicts that “the Kuomintang government will arrest ex-President Chen before the end of this month to curry favor with Chen Yunlin.”

It seems to be time for DPP supporters to decide if this kind of psychological warfare against the government really helps the country. When one major political party starts accusing another one of treason simply because it doesn’t want to see one of their own champions in the dock, this really weakens the country’s position. It could well be the DPP, rather than the KMT which is currently doing more damage to Taiwan.

If Taiwan wants to stand its ground as a free country, its politicians shouldn’t go overboard. Freedom requires a minimum of unity and respect – especially for Taiwan.

Hermit’s Scientific History Lesson: Farming Now and Then

Hello Children,

the 17th CCP Central Committee’s Third Plenary Session has written a frank list of wishes to Papa Christmas this week. Papa Christmas is kindly asked to basically eliminate absolute poverty in rural areas by 2020, according to a communique issued on the plenum’s conclusion.

Now, I can already hear some of you snotty fellas say: “Why, the CCP doesn’t believe in Papa Christmas!”

Of course not, children. That’s why some good local cadres and some of their good patrons in Beijing can’t agree to give the farmers substantial political rights. If Papa Christmas existed, he could take good care of the cadres and make them rich, while the farmers could take care of their own business and get a bit richer, too.

This is exactly the problem, children. There is no Papa Christmas. Nowhere.

Now, you may ask: why then don’t the farmers make a revolution, as they did so often before? Shhht!! This is a very dangerous question! Besides, the countryside doesn’t make revolutions. OK, Mao Zedong said that the people, and only the people, are the creators of history. But an old book*) tells me that only the Han Dynasty came to power after an uprising from the people, that at the time of the Five Dynasties, five men from the people ruled, and just one more dynasty after that was founded by the son of a farmhand. So, in all those thousands of years of our country’s venerable history, there were really only three people-based revolutions, if I can believe that book.

Isn’t it time for the CCP to refurbish its history books? I mean, in this case, won’t the facts actually serve the Party better than the, umm, edited records?

I’ll call a scientific patriotic conference on Monday to get the corrections started. Got to fly now, children. Stay patriotic and continue to believe in Papa Christmas. Especially if you live in the socialist countryside.

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*) Klaus A. Dietsch, Staat und Gesellschaft, in: Das Alte China, ed. Roger Goepper, Munich 1988, p. 1155