HOSTED BY BRIAN BERLETIC. Historian and podcaster Carl Zha and international relations and security expert Mark Sleboda join the New Atlas again, this time to talk about Russian-Chinese history and whether or not there is any historical basis for the West’s current desire to see a new “Sino-Soviet” split.
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PETER MAN—I am from Hong Kong and have become a Canadian like Sana. I worked in the mainstream media in the early days of my career and actually built a national Chinese-language television station in Canada. That was a long time ago. When Hong Kong was handed back to China in 1997, I returned to my hometown to watch that historical event. I ended up getting a job in China and lived there for almost two decades. I have witnessed China’s rise and I can share one of my experiences in a few words. I was utterly shocked by the complete disregard for factual reporting of China by Western journalists.
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ELENA PANINA—While there are indications that Japan will join AUKUS, the Chinese civilization still have an almost bloodthirsty bone to pick with Japan as a result of both the first and second Sino-Japanese wars. I read what the Chinese people say, and cannot but come to the conclusion that they will wipe Japan off the map with relish. Yet, they are a serious people and they are not disrespectful or take decisions about the lives of others on a whim. They also do what they say they are doing and do not play.
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FINIAN CUNNINGHAM—This week saw an upsurge in Chinese infections from Covid-19 in the capital Beijing and other cities. There were three reported deaths from the disease. The China figures are still relatively low compared with infection and deaths in Western states. For example, in the United States, it is reported that deaths from Covid-related illnesses are about 1,000 per day, which is down from a high of 4,000 per day last winter.
Still, there is an unseemly tone of glee in Western media reports and comments that China’s zero-Covid strategy is allegedly failing to contain the disease. The Financial Times, the BBC and other media were peppered with accompanying chiding calls on the Chinese government to drop its “Communist controls” and to adopt a “living [dying] with Covid” approach.
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Editor’s Note: We are lucky to have French-American Jeff J. Brown, an expert on China, the Mideast, France, and other cultures, as one of our editorial pillars. (Jeff is of course the editor-in-chief of the unique China Rising blog, a sister entity to TGP). His expertise on China, indispensable for any American or Westerner, spanning already three major books, is detailed below. In this episode, Jeff joins Ania K., to chat about the rapidly deteriorating situation in France and the EU/NATO blocs, in general, as self-serving, US-pushed neoliberal imperial policies seem to be finally harvesting the same reaction across the continent in hitherto contained populations: anger, frustration and an almost universal desire for regime change that still lacks a fitting political channel.
