CHINA, THE SEA BULLY

Should we bomb the Chinese out of the Scarborough Shoal?

That would be the biggest mistake ever because it would start a huge war between the Philippines and China; between the USA and China; between Taiwan and the Philippines; between Macau and the Philippines. And hopefully we could be asssured that the Chinese in the Philippines would be siding with the Filipino people versus China.

That's hardly what we want at this time this war. We still have many hopes and dreams of living a longer life, enjoying its up and downs with our families, our significant others, our kababayan who are reeling from the many decades of misgovernance till Pres. Duterte whose pronouncements every day center on cleaning up this government. .

Now we are seeing a different world, with different perspectives of existing; that after all we could still look forward to a happy life. What is happiness? Ay, there's the great discussion.

What is happiness for the Chinese?

Actually the Chinese we are looking at do not have an ounce of the Marxist outlook of Mao Ze Dong. They are hardly communists that we would call based on our understanding of communism during the 60's. The Marxists, or Maoists then believed in communal possession of properties; of the leadership of the proletariat and the farmers and all other poor people. They believed, the Maoists, that only an armed struggle would allow them to attain that Utopia where everybody, or almost everybody is happy.

The masses of workers and farmers were iconized, idealized, so much so that during the Cultural Revolution of the 60's, the intellectuals and artists – including musical composers were made to go to the rural areas to serve them, to work and experience their sufferings with them though some of the former regretted having been sent there.

Well the treatment of the Filipino fisherfolks by the Chinese navy hardly exhibits an ounce of sympathy for the plight of the poor. Rather, the Chinese of today, those who are leading the group who have taken over the Shoal, are what are called Communist Government Bureaucrats but not Communists. Their economic policies allow for exploitation of private individuals of the resources, of establishing huge multi-billion companies that would give enough wealth to China. However, it has retained the government structure set up as Communist, minus the original tenets of the ideology. So there are plenty of leaders who rule for life, dictating what should be done economically. That is indeed very far from the democratic way of life we are now experiencing in the country.

In fact, I was reading the biography of Xi Jian Ping and discerned that the Chinese period he lived in, since 1953, when he was born, do not run parallel at all to Philippine history. Whereas our history walked the path to greater and stronger democracy (until Marcos came along who set up martial law), China went the way of chopping off the forces of liberalism through its Cultural Revolution of the 60's. And when Mao Ze Dong died after that, the capitalist forces came in which has created the quick development of the industries of China, the building of large military warfare machinery which are now being used against the Philippines in the Shoal. China is now a world power to contend with.

But the left in the country should not be deceived by the name of China who still carries the word “communist” only because it has the semblance of a communist party but in praxis it is hardly what we would call communist, especially in their treatment of the democratic student movement in Hong Kong, the Third World forces, the small fisherfolks who have a difficult time eking out a living now after the Chinese military forces grabbed that Shoal from us and have prevented any entry of foreigners in the area.

Why does wealth blind people to acquire too much wealth to the point of denying others the right to live? Did Marxism draw the Chinese to that direction? But then Vietnam is communist and yet it is giving us that high moral support, as it is a contender also in that area. The victory of the Philippines in the International Tribunal declaring that China does not have any ounce of valid ownership of the waters there has been a source of pride of us in the whole planet, except Macau and Taiwan, and of course China.

How do we solve the big panda problem? My idea is

If our position as decided upon would be upheld in any negotiations with China, we must enter into a discussion with our strong position as defined by the International Arbitration Center. Otherwise, let us gather all the countries of the world to discuss economic sanctions that could be imposed on countries that ignore, reject and dismiss resolutions, covenants, and decisions among others, that have been issued by and adhered to globally.

By doing this, we are strengthening the standing of the United Nations as the last arbiter of conflicts and therefore its acts should be respected and obeyed by signatories to the UN Convention. Wealth and power in this world need not be too glorified as to make a county blind to very humane problems as hunger, thirst, and struggles for existence itself whether internal or external to a country.

By the way, we can also have a fluvial parade around the Scarborough Shoal, with all the fishing folks and their bancas surrounding it while all the Philippine Navy ships are on standby. How is that for a colorful entry into the world politics and confronting the big sea bully?