Is Xi Jinping the second Hitler?

PerryScope

By Perry Diaz

Anti-China demonstration in Vietnam.

During his interview with the New York Times at the Malacañang Palace last February 4, 2014, President Benigno Aquino III brought to the attention of the international community China’s aggressive moves in the South China Sea. Little did he know that when he likened China’s rulers to Hitler, it would evoke a vitriolic response from China.

Aquino drew comparison to Germany’s demands for a tiny slice of Czechoslovakia, the Sudetenland, in 1938. To appease Germany’s Adolf Hitler, the European powers signed an agreement that ceded Sudetenland in exchange for peace. It was a small price to pay to preserve peace in Europe. It came to be known as the “Munich Appeasement.”

Czechoslovakia was then forced to abide by the agreement after Britain and France told her that she either give up Sudetenland or fight Germany… alone. Czechoslovakia chose to surrender Sudetenland. But Germany got more than what she bargained for: de facto control of the rest of Czechoslovakia for as long as Hitler kept his “solemn pledge” not to go any farther.

Britain and France didn’t realize that appeasing Hitler was like feeding a hungry viper with little mice – it would only increase the viper’s appetite for a much bigger meal. To their horror, Hitler broke his “solemn pledge” and his tanks and troops rumbled into Prague on March 14, 1939. That’s when all hell broke loose and World War II began!

Déjà vu

Scarborough Shoal

Seventy-four years after Germany invaded Czechoslovakia, it seems that history is about to repeat itself halfway around the world – in the South and East China Seas.

In 2012, China and the Philippines agreed to an American-mediated deal wherein both sides would withdraw their forces from Scarborough Shoal while the dispute was being negotiated. The Philippines abided by the agreement and withdrew her forces. But China reneged. Instead, she took possession of the shoal and roped off the narrow entrance to the shoal’s lagoon; thus, preventing Filipino fishermen from entering.

During his interview, Aquino said, “If we say yes to something we believe is wrong now, what guarantee is there that the wrong will not be further exacerbated down the line?” Then he added, “At what point do you say, ‘Enough is enough’? Well, the world has to say it — remember that the Sudetenland was given in an attempt to appease Hitler to prevent World War II.”But like Czechoslovakia, the Philippines is powerless to stop a Chinese invasion.

He urged the world leaders not to make the same mistake the European powers made in 1938. But peace is not what’s in the minds of Chinese leaders who are acting just like Hitler did seven decades ago. And now China is poised to grab the Kalayaan group of islands in the Spratlys and the Japanese-administered Senkaku islands in the East China Sea claimed by Japan, China, and Taiwan.

China vs. Japan-U.S.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

During the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last January, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters that China and Japan were in a “similar situation” to Britain and Germany before 1914. He said that Britain and Germany were the largest trade partners then, but it did not prevent the two countries from going to war… against each other.

Senkaku Islands

Should war break out between Japan and China, it is expected that the United States would come to the aid of Japan by virtue of the U.S.-Japan Treaty, which obligated the U.S. to defend Japan from external aggression. Last February 7, in a meeting in Washington, DC between U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, Kerry reiterated, “the U.S. won’t abandon Japan should an attack from China emerge.” And this is probably what deters China from attacking the Senkaku islands, which the U.S. recognizes as an integral part of Japan.

Philippines vs. China

Pag-asa island in the Kalayaan group of islands.

But in the case of Scarborough Shoal and the Kalayaan group of islands, the U.S. considers them as “disputed territories” and therefore wouldn’t take sides between the claimants, China and the Philippines. However, it could be a different situation if China invaded the islands within the Philippines’ 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), which the Philippines believe is covered under the U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty. However, the U.S. has not made any firm commitment to defend these islands; thus, sending mixed signals to China.

It did not then come as a surprise when China launched a scathing attack against Aquino for comparing China to Nazi Germany. Calling Aquino “ignorant,” the state-owned Xinhua news service described his remarks as senseless and said it had “exposed his true colors as an amateurish politician who was ignorant both of history and reality.”

Last February 7, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hong Lei described Aquino’s remarks as “inconceivable and unreasonable.” “As an unwavering upholder of international justice, China made huge sacrifice and indelible historical contribution to the victory of the World Anti-Fascist War,” Hong said in reference to China’s role in World War II. But while it’s true that China was on the side of the U.S. against Japan in World War II, China was then ruled by the Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. It was only in 1948 — after World War II had ended — when the Chinese Communist Party under Mao Zedong took over the government, forcing the Kuomintang to flee to Taiwan a year later.

China Dream

“The Chinese dream, the dream of a strong military”

In my article, “Xi Jinping’s Pax Sinica” (November 3, 2013), I wrote:“Last October 31, 2013, China’s state-run Global Times published an article, saying that escalating tensions between China and Japan over territorial claims to the Senkaku Islands could ignite a war. It said that Beijing was preparing for a ‘worst-case’ scenario of military conflict over the disputed islands.

“It seems that China’s ‘worst-case’ scenario is a deliberate attempt to fulfill Xi’s ‘Chinese Dream,’ which is the revival of imperial China — or Pax Sinica (Chinese Peace) – that had maintained Chinese hegemony in Asia during the reign of the Ming dynasty. ‘The great revival of the Chinese nation is the greatest Chinese Dream,’ Xi said before taking office in November 2012.

“Surmise it to say, China’s carefully orchestrated actions in the past two years are leading to war against Japan… and ultimately against the United States, with the goal of ending American hegemony – Pax Americana — in the Pacific.”

Xi Jinping and Adolf Hitler

And to fulfill Xi’s “China Dream,” the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has ambitious plans over the next 15 years to upgrade its fleet of surface ships as well as weapons systems. And this was recently manifested when PLA sailors stood in formation on the deck of Liaoning, China’s first and only aircraft carrier, forming six Chinese characters that read: “The Chinese dream, the dream of a strong military.” It seems that China is ready to go to war, which makes one wonder: Is Xi Jinping the second Hitler?

(PerryDiaz@gmail.com)