Taiwan navy releases first video of self-designed ‘killer’ warship Tuo Jiang

[biendong]

When will you "take back"? It's been over 60 years already. Maybe you will "take back" in 6000 years? After all, it only took 1000 years for your Chinese masters to get bored of Vietnam and leave on their own.

Taiwan can't swallow it. we take it back soon.

after 1000 years we kicked you back to China. It is history.

 

[AgentOrange]

Taiwan can't swallow it. we take it back soon.

after 1000 years we kicked you back to China. It is history.

After 1000 years, we went back to China on our own because we taught you people how to be civilized. Well...we tried. You're welcome, by the way.

 

[biendong]

After 1000 years, we went back to China on our own because we taught you people how to be civilized. Well...we tried. You're welcome, by the way.

3 super powers barbarian went home from VN. good luck .

 

[Lure]

I was talking with another member on how western media has always disrepected China while Taiwan does not receive that level of disrespect.

You jumped in and made the conclusion that it simply "proves" that the US/west sees China as an adversary and Taiwan as an entity that can be influenced.

Why can't you see my counter-examples? The US was on friendly terms with China during 1970-90, and perceived China as a potential partner to counter Soviet policies in Asia (as you have rightly argued), yet mainstream western media was disrepectful towards China, and the Chinese people in general during that same period.

According to your logic, China should have been given respect by mainstream western media during that time period, but it wasn't the case. Your assertion that China was favoured by mainstream western media is not true. If you had said China was favoured in the diplomatic and academic literature during that period, I would have agreed, but certainly not in mainstream western media. And that form of disrespects in mainstream media continues until this day. One of the main factor for this attitude in mainstream western media is its "racism."

We are talking about something that is absolutely subjective here. I can bring some piece of news from 70's and 80's that praises China and you can bring some piece of news from the same era that opposes China. However for 70's and 80's era that is absolutely clear that a good portion of Western Media was much more softer to China.

For example Deng Xiaoping was selected 2 times as the Most Influential Person of the year by Times Magazine. First in 78 than in 85.

From the early times of the Rapprochement wit China movement in United States I can also give following examples :

In a column “Looking Toward Peking: Washington Shows New Frankness on Policies Long under Discussion,”
Max Frankel, chief of the Times’ Washington Bureau and its major China watcher, claimed that the most important
thing about the speech was that “it was made at all.” While calling Kennedy’s China advisers timid because of the offensives of Joseph McCarthy (R-WI) and the China Lobby during the 1950s, he described the Chinese leaders as “prudent and sensible.” Frankel also appealed to readers by saying that the statement was “aimed at Americans” and that it was a call for their “realism and moderation” in dealing with Beijing.

Washington Post also critisized the foreign policy of US in early 60's. It criticized the absence of fresh policy on China by asking a question, “After six years, has the United States nothing more to say than that if China changes, the situation might improve? Not even a trial balloon?”

Also there is a reason why Times was so anti-PRC back in 60's and changed itself later in 70's.

The hostility of Time to China was closely related to its owner Henry Luce, the son of missionary parents who had worked in China before 1949. Luce liked to tell friends that the only ambassadorship he would take was to a “restored democracy in China.” His championing of the Nationalists was so much that by the time they were driven out of the mainland, Chiang Kai-shek had appeared on the cover of Time more often than anyone else--even more frequently than
Roosevelt or Churchill or Hitler. Luce was a leading member of the China Lobby, in which the most important nation-wide bipartisan organization was called the Committee of One Million, founded in 1953 to mobilize sentiment against any “appeasement of Communist China.”

And the following is from the Henry Grunwald era of Time Magazine.

Time published several large pictures of the American team’s activities in China. In an article based on witness accounts of Life’s two reporters, it described China as “a nation that was unified and organized--with a level of poverty, but absolutely no misery” and the people as “healthy and self-confident. Moreover, it described Zhou Enlai as “smooth, very handsome, and quite witty.” In 1954 when Zhou Enlai led the Chinese delegation to the Geneva Convention, Life had called him “a political thug,” “a ruthless intriguer, a conscienceless liar and a sabertoothed political assassin.” In the brand new atmosphere, newspapers and magazines also ran articles tracing the development of Sino-American relations. Some of them dated the “traditional friendship” between the two countries back to the American Revolution.

By the way your remarks made me find an extremely nice piece of academic thesis about the media and China-US relations. The author made cross reading between Chinese and US sources. A brilliant academic piece, of course written by a Chinese academician - Guolin Yi. Here's the link.

http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1718&context=oa_dissertations

You can also read that to have more information on the topic and to see how parallel the media coverage is to US foreign policy.

@LeveragedBuyout you can also have a look at this brilliant study. I haven't finished it entirely yet it's very delightful to read.

This is false. NZ is not an ally of the US. They have already broken off their alliance, which was stipulated in the ANZUS treaty, back in 1984. NZ had refused entry for any US military vessels that carries or is powered by nuke. The US then suspended its ally obligations to NZ as a response. NZ further hardened and made it a law to make NZ a nuke-free zone. Ronald Reagan then publically announced that NZ is no longer a US ally.

Up until this day, NZ and the US still have not reinstated their alliance. The US banned port entry for NZ navy vessels right up to 2012. Saying that NZ is a non-NATO US major ally is a lie. NZ have refused, and even criticised, to participate in fighting against Iraq (when Saddam was still alive). It never gave up its nuke-free policy, even when pressured by the US. Simply, NZ is not a country that the US can just simply influence or push around. Yet, NZ haven't generally received any disrespect from mainstream western media (hint: NZ is Anglo-Saxon majority).

NZ is an example that disprove your simple logic about "disrespect = you are perceived as an adversary" ... "no disrespect = you can be influenced" (a pawn).

Your information about alliance of US with NZ is not up to date. NZ is a major US non-Nato ally. Bill Clinton officially gave NZ this status 1997. Here is the link.

22 U.S. Code § 2321k - Designation of major non-NATO allies | LII / Legal Information Institute

(a) Notice to Congress
The President shall notify the Congress in writing at least 30 days before—
(1)designating a country as a major non-NATO ally for purposes of this chapter and the Arms Export Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2751 et seq.); or
(2) terminating such a designation.

(b) Initial designations
Australia, Egypt, Israel, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and New Zealand shall be deemed to have been so designated by the President as of the effective date of this section, and the President is not required to notify the Congress of such designation of those countries.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

@Lure

Thanks for the study. It will take me some time to read it.

As far as the treatment of XYZ country by US media, I have to ask, what is the utility of such a discussion? The US media is driven by a complex set of factors:

1) The US media is privately owned, so the influence of government policies is limited.

2) The US media is almost entirely left-wing, which is why the USSR received very sympathetic treatment from American media even through the Cold War, and why the likes of Paul Krugman and Thomas Friedman praise China every other week (and why the US media covers for Emperor Obama).

3) Some media is owned by individuals, and are driven by their ideologies. Some media is owned by corporations, and driven by profit.

4) As the Chinese contingent reminds us again and again (and again), it does not care what foreigners think about China. China does not care, so it does not explain. It does not explain, so its intentions are opaque. Its intentions are opaque, so US media can interpret it any way it wants to spin it (based on ideology or what sells the most). Is it any wonder that China is often misunderstood? But that's up to China, not American media, to resolve.

I would say that Taiwan, if it is noticed at all by American media, gets relatively positive treatment because it is small, the populace knows we have a defense treaty with Taiwan (even if the populace doesn't know the history or reasoning behind it), and that a lot of our products are made in Taiwan. That's enough: Taiwan is on our side, so it is Good. Contrast with China, which is big and powerful, is Communist, constantly rails against the US and declares its intentions to "balance" the US in Asia, and is blamed by many for our unemployment problems, and it's easy to see that there's a natural bias. It was great to have China on our side against the USSR, but once the USSR was gone, it was harder to overlook these flaws, just as it's been harder to overlook the flaws of all of America's less than cooperative "allies" (Germany, France, Turkey, NZ, South Korea, Israel, etc.).

Really, I don't think it's any more complicated than that; it has little or nothing to do with foreign policy objectives, and everything to do with the market of ideas, and What Have You Done For Us Lately. If China wants to change its image, the West has provided it with the tools to do so. But China doesn't care what the West thinks, right? As a consequence, don't expect China to receive favorable coverage.

 

[Lure]

4) As the Chinese contingent reminds us again and again (and again), it does not care what foreigners think about China. China does not care, so it does not explain. It does not explain, so its intentions are opaque. Its intentions are opaque, so US media can interpret it any way it want to spin it (based on ideology or what sells the most). Is it any wonder that China is often misunderstood? But that's up to China, not American media, to resolve.

Really, I don't think it's any more complicated than that; it has little or nothing to do with foreign policy objectives, and everything to do with the market of ideas, and What Have You Done For Us Lately. If China wants to change its image, the West has provided it with the tools to do so. But China doesn't care what the West thinks, right? As a consequence, don't expect China to receive favorable coverage.

Very nice reasoning. I definitely agree. Altough I always thought the foreign policy had influence on news coverages in US. However you might have a better grasp than I do, since you're more exposed to US media than me.