Imprisonment and Other "Irritations"
EDITORIAL Imprisonment and Other "Irritations" "I think the relationship is on the upswing now, I now that these irritations are behind us, and I J-know they are anxious to move forward." That...
...Then they offered up a few unjustly imprisoned Americans...
...It urged Congress to pass permanent most-favored-nation status for China, and Congress duly com-plied—even though Beijing still has resisted agreement on its entry into the World Trade Organization...
...The Chinese released him and his father, and now, months later, they have let Ms...
...This week the Chinese get extra brownie points at the State Department for not spoiling Powell's visit...
...It announced its willingness to see Beijing get the 2008 Olympics, and Beijing got the Olympics...
...The Bush administration's answer is no, not for these or any other appalling acts by the Chinese government...
...When the Chinese then presented a bill for "housing" the American crew, the administration indicated it was willing to pay up...
...Well, yes, for a couple of days every few months the Chinese government can tidy things up, hide the prisoners and the torture victims, suspend the military exercises aimed at Taiwan, hold off on the next sale of missile technology to Pakistan and Iraq, and pass out their human gifts...
...Is there no cost to the Chinese for such behavior...
...The Chinese government told him to stuff it, and he backed down...
...Nothing...
...Business (literally) as usual...
...So the answer to the question—will the Chinese ever pay a price?—is no...
...When the Chinese refused to let the plane fly home, and insisted that it be carved into pieces for transport, the Bush administration agreed...
...Qin as a gift to Secretary Powell, a human gift, as a token of their goodwill...
...That keen geopolitical insight, uttered by Secretary of State Colin Powell on the eve of his visit to Beijing, nicely captures the Bush administration's policy of appeasement toward the Chinese dictatorship...
...When they release American planes they knock down, when they deport the American citizens they lock up, they will be rewarded with American gratitude: Thanks for pulling that knife out of my side...
...Gao go...
...And the Bush administration (and its corporate backers), the foreign policy establishment (and its corporate sponsors), the Democrats and Republicans (and their corporate donors), and the American press will declare the visit a success, a sign of progress...
...So while Beijing continued to poke fingers into American eyes—locking up Americans, carrying out threatening military exercises in the Taiwan Strait, denouncing the administration in every conceivable international forum—the Bush administration lavished the Chinese with multi-billion dollar gifts...
...What an irritation that was...
...And what did the Chinese have to do to repair relations all this time, to play their part in what American journalists euphemistically call this great power "minuet...
...That was all it took to convince the desperately eager Powell that the Chinese "are anxious to move forward...
...Li and Mr...
...When Beijing told his administration not to sell Taiwan the Aegis battle management system or other advanced weaponry, his administration did as it was told...
...And Powell accepted the gift in that spirit: "I think the relationship is on the upswing now, now that these irritations are behind us...
...In return for this avalanche of American blandishments, they indicated that improving relations was okay by them—if it meant unilateral American concessions...
...If you think this new team is a bunch of tough guys when it comes to China, think again...
...It seems the president and his secretary of state, like their predecessors, are willing to eat almost unlimited quantities of—well, for decorum's sake, let's call it mud—if that's what it takes to make Beijing happy...
...Then they presented her, Mr...
...The Bush administration, you see, has been desperate for good relations with the Chinese, more or less regardless of Chinese behavior...
...Li spent a few months in jail, was "convicted," and then deported...
...Bush even allowed the Chinese to proceed with a multi-billion dollar contract to build a fiber-optic cable system in Iraq, employing the same Chinese technicians who helped Saddam with his air defenses...
...They're still working on that "rule of law" thing, you know...
...When it comes to courting the Chinese, love means always having to say you're sorry...
...Really...
...But even if there were no American citizens and residents still rotting in Chinese jails, not to mention the Chinese victims of the Beijing dictatorship, can it be that the Bush administration's only response to the arrest, jailing, phony conviction, and then deportation of American citizens and American residents is: Thank you for clearing up that mess...
...Irritations behind us...
...What prompted Powell's optimistic assessment of the state of Sino-American relations, of course, was China's deportation last week of an American citizen, Li Shaomin, and its release of two permanent residents of the United States, Gao Zhan and Qin Guangguang...
...Set aside for a moment that another American citizen, Wu Jianmin, remains locked in a Chinese prison cell after being seized on April 8, or that another American resident, Liu Yaping, has been in prison since March 8. And never mind the democracy activists, Falun Gong members, Tibetan Buddhists, and Christians still being held, tortured, and sometimes murdered...
...These are all academics whom Beijing had earlier arrested on trumped-up charges of "spying...
...Qin, was so obviously innocent of the ludicrous charges against her...
...Li, and Mr...
...Those "irritations" are most assuredly not "behind us," though perhaps the Chinese are eventually going to tie ribbons around their bruised bodies, too, so that President Bush will have a nice party favor waiting for him when he travels to Beijing this October...
...I guarantee it...
...When the Chinese helped Iraq build a sophisticated air defense system, the better to shoot down American pilots, President Bush asked them to please explain themselves...
...Before Powell left for Beijing, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage gushed like a proud mommy that the Chinese were "going to be on their absolute best behavior" during Powell's trip...
...Gao was seized almost six months ago, Chinese authorities also locked up her husband and subjected their 5-year-old son—an American citizen—to a unique form of child torture, isolating him from his parents without explanation for 26 days...
...When Ms...
...Because she, like Mr...
...Robert Kagan and William Kristol...
...The Chinese first convicted her and sentenced her to 10 years in prison in court proceedings so hasty they would make a kangaroo blush...
...When the Chinese knocked an American surveillance plane out of the sky last April, then held the crew hostage for more than a week, the Chinese demanded an apology, and the Bush administration provided one...
...Everybody happy...
...That's it...
Vol. 6 • August 2001 • No. 44
