Category: Thinking About China

Saving Taiwan

Commentary Several recent articles in the American press have labeled Taiwan the most likely place for a China-U.S. nuclear war to break out and have called for Washington to avoid such a catastrophe by withdrawing its forces from the area and making no commitments to defending Taiwan. This advice follows in the wake of some…


China’s ‘Anti-Addiction System’ Is Just a Political Tool to Profit From the Gaming Industry

Commentary The Economic Information Daily, a subsidiary of Chinese state-run media Xinhua News, published a report on Aug. 3 that heavily criticizes Tencent Holdings’ flagship game “Honor of Kings.” Tencent has throughout the years been bending over backwards to adhere to Beijing’s regulations for online games, but now the company is in hot water. This…


China’s Death Sentence Against Canada’s Schellenberg Is Terrorism

Commentary On Aug. 10, Canadian Robert Schellenberg lost an appeal against a death sentence, pronounced in a northeastern Chinese court. In China, “justice” is normally swift in these matters. Except the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) guillotine will, at least for the moment, likely be stayed by the high-profile politics of the case, which are by…


China’s Brutal Caste System

Commentary In a piece for The Atlantic, David Brooks laments the decline of American society. “These days,” writes Brooks, “your education level and political values are as important in defining your class status as your income is.” The country has split into two distinct, “separate class hierarchies—one red and one blue.” The “ideological divide” is…


As Meng’s Case Reaches Final Stage, Beijing’s Warning Shots Are Loud and Clear

Commentary The Chinese Communist Party has demonstrated beyond doubt how ruthless it truly is and the lengths it is willing to go to in order to bend countries like Canada to its will. On Aug. 10, a court in Liaoning Province rejected the appeal of a death sentence for Robert Schellenberg, a Canadian citizen who…


Let’s Boycott the Genocide Games in Beijing

Commentary Three days ago the Olympic Games in Tokyo ended, with athletes celebrating their medals and nursing their losses. Now, all eyes turn to the next Olympics—the Winter Games next year—and increasingly the question of the legitimacy of the host city: Beijing. It is extremely rare for two successive host cities for the Games—Summer and…


Xi Jinping’s Crackdown on Private Tech Is Endangering Military Modernization

Commentary Is Xi Jinping killing the goose that laid the golden eggs? The head of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) wants to harness the innovative potential of domestic high-tech, but his assaults on private tech companies could prove the law of unintended consequences. In recent months, the CCP has cracked down hard on China’s private-sector…


The Chinese Communist Party Shuts Down a Money Flow From Abroad

Commentary Beijing’s decisions last month cost American investors a lot of money. Regulatory moves against Chinese companies that have recently listed shares on American exchanges have all but shut down the burgeoning market for such listings. They have also sliced deeply into the value of those companies that had already been listed. On the surface,…


The Chinese Regime Must Pay for the Pandemic, Avoiding the Winter Olympics Solves Nothing

Commentary Aldous Huxley once compared “a walk in the country” to a religious-like pilgrimage. “To commune with the fields and waters, the woodlands and the hills,” he wrote, “is to commune, according to our modern and northern ideas, with the visible manifestations of the Wisdom and Spirit of the Universe.” Now, thanks to the most…


Ireland’s Hazel Chu Right to Condemn China’s Abuses

Commentary The chairwoman of Ireland’s Green Party, Hazel Chu, recently compared China’s internment of the Uyghurs to the Tiananmen Square massacre. Chu is right to condemn the repression of the Uyghurs, which ought to be more widely recognized as a genocide. Chu, who just completed her term as Mayor of Dublin, pronounces freely on foreign…