Peace

Empires rise and fall

[Patrick in China @PatrickZhengCHN]

Kishore Mahbubani nails it: "So after China has gone through the best 30-year period ever under the Chinese Communist Party, the United States is telling the Chinese people: 'Why don't you get rid of the Chinese Communist Party?' And the Chinese people are scratching their head and saying, 'Excuse me, you know... are you serious?'"

[taseenb @taseenb]

“The real question is not whether China can rise peacefully.
It already did.

The question is whether America can decline peacefully.”

[Dragon kingdom.wu🌃 @loongkingdom]

The attitude of the Chinese government towards this has remained the same for thousands of years: it neither supports nor opposes it. As long as your personal lifestyle does not get indoctrinated or promoted in the public domain.

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

If you understand this story, you’ve understood much there is to understand about geopolitics around Taiwan.

The current DPP government is quite literally cheering its own carve-up - as long as it annoys Beijing.

Here is what happened.

So recently, May 28th, Japanese PM Takaichi and Philippines President Marcos Jr. issued a joint statement (https://t.co/T3HUFO3oDI) announcing they would open negotiations to delimit their overlapping EEZ and continental-shelf boundaries.

As a reminder, an EEZ - Exclusive Economic Zone - is the area extending 200 nautical miles from a country's coastline within which that country has exclusive rights to exploit all natural resources.

Small problem: their EEZs directly overlap with China's, both from Beijing’s standpoint and Taipei’s, as they are less than 200 nautical miles from Taiwan’s coastline.

In effect, what Japan and the Philippines are announcing here is that they're agreeing bilaterally - without Beijing or Taipei at the table - to split between themselves waters that belong, in part, to someone else.

Unsurprisingly, that didn't sit well with Beijing. They issued a statement the day after - 29th of May - where they "strongly deplore and firmly oppose the so-called maritime delimitation talks between Japan and the Philippines" (https://t.co/d9mLwvTcpI).

Any rational person would have expected Taipei to issue a similar statement because, whatever you think of Beijing's claims, it's the EEZ around Taiwan we're speaking about here: surely they'd object to other countries carving up the resource rights off their coastline.

It's actually one thing Beijing and Taipei have aligned interests on: neither wants its maritime entitlements carved up by third parties.

As a reminder Taipei rejected the infamous 2016 Hague arbitration ruling on the South China Sea - siding with Beijing against Manila - for the same reasons: because the tribunal downgraded Taiping (Itu Aba), the largest feature in the Spratlys that Taipei occupies, from an “island” to a “rock,” which would have stripped it of its 200-nautical-mile EEZ.

In other words, defending their own EEZ is normally sacrosanct for Taipei.

Except... not this time. Taipei issued an angry statement, yes, but where the anger was entirely directed at Beijing. The statement (https://t.co/HXekJR7fvi) explicitly “commend[ed] Japan and the Philippines for working to resolve maritime differences”, reserving its sharp language to China because it "has no right to comment on the territory and appertaining waters of the Republic of China (Taiwan)."

Think for a moment about what it says about Taipei’s current DPP independentist government: the party that claims to champion Taiwan's sovereignty literally celebrated, as its first instinct, two countries announcing they'd carve up Taiwan's maritime territory between themselves. All because Beijing opposed it.

This caused quite a stir in Taiwanese politics, with the KMT calling the statement “humiliating,” warning that cheering the talks without seeking a seat in negotiations over the overlapping EEZs could seriously hurt Taiwanese fishermen's livelihoods in the future (https://t.co/5T2jW4HQb5).

So much so that Taipei’s MOFA had to issue a new statement on June 2 specifying that the Japan-Philippines talks "should not impair our country's rights", with MOFA spokesperson Hsiao Kuang-wei finally acknowledging the delimitation waters “highly overlap” with Taipei's EEZ.

But then, confusingly, 2 days after - June 4 - Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung undercut his own ministry’s correction entirely (https://t.co/hgAu7Quj1H). The Japan-Philippines talks, he explained, are “aimed at China” and therefore, fundamentally good - Taipei's EEZ being carved up in the process being, apparently, a minor detail.

China protesting the talks, he said, is “getting cause and effect backwards” and he branded “the handful distorting the issue and shifting the focus” - i.e. anyone pointing out that Taiwan's EEZ is being carved up - as “falling into a trap and letting China benefit.”

So the same ministry, within 48 hours, both (a) asked Tokyo and Manila to guard against a danger to Taiwan's EEZ, and (b) declared that danger nonexistent and smeared anyone naming it as a Beijing stooge. Go figure 🤷

But this is actually just one part of a much bigger story - one about colonial nostalgia, about the three competing visions at play for Taiwan, and about why the West champions the one party in Taiwan that does NOT actually defend sovereignty and democracy.

I wrote it all up here: https://t.co/tWqeM8xpX8

[Ounka @OunkaOnX]

Jimmy Dore: "We preach democracy to China. But we don't have democracy here - the oligarchs run everything. The Princeton study proved 90% of people's wishes never become law. Only the top 10% of wealthy matter.

In China, the government sits above capital. The economy works for the people. Here, capital sits above government. The economy works for billionaires"

[Nesta @dprkarlos]

Los cables filtrados de la embajada de EEUU desmintieron las supuestas masacres en la plaza de Tiananmen, confirmando en gran parte la versión oficial del gobierno chino.

Pero las ONGs de derechos humanos, el brazo más repulsivo de la CIA, siguen intentando colocar el relato.

[Angelo Giuliano 🇨🇭🇮🇹 @angeloinchina]

INDONESIA >

“Leaked docs expose how Soros’ Open Society Foundations (via Jakarta’s Kurawal Foundation) bankrolled Indonesian opposition: millions poured into youth activist groups, ‘independent’ media, the viral ‘Dirty Vote’ documentary, and lawfare ops to ‘prevent the continuation’ of Prabowo’s elected government.

Since Prabowo’s 2024 landslide win, waves of protests — fueled by real economic grievances — were amplified and directed through OSF-funded networks training Gen Z for ‘resistance,’ pushing police reform campaigns, and radicalizing civil society to challenge power.

Classic playbook turning legitimate anger into regime-change pressure, with One Piece pirate flags popping up as the symbol.

Full must-read from @TheGrayzone 👇
https://t.co/vmWtLucvlp”

[Lulu☁️ @muixyui]

never forget how the US used agent orange during the Vietnam War: sprayed on civillians, contaminating land, damaging ecosystems, and generations later kids are still born with disabilities linked to dioxin exposure. The US never issued a formal apology and paid compensation

[𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐖𝐓𝐘𝐌𝐄 🇨🇳🇺🇸⚜️ @DetroitShowtyme]

🔥🎙️🔥Why is the American military censoring any mention of the innocent soldiers and civilians who died in Beijing as a consequence of the U.S. involvement in instigating a failed color revolution around Tianamen Square in 1989?

What have 37 years of commemorating, obsessing over and exploiting the memory of the 1989 Tianamen Square tragedy taught us? After 37 years, have we learned anything of value?

Do we know exactly who were the student leaders and what were their objectives? Do we know for certain the Chinese government intentionally massacred innocent civilians? How many soldiers died, how were they slaughtered by “unarmed nonviolent students”? What were the geopolitical implications of all of this? Was there outside Western influence in inciting the conflict? Does the event even hold enough historical significance worth recalling?

My studies of Tiananmen Square 89' (TS89) have concluded that it is pretty much a huge nothing burger. Just one of countless protests and instances of violence that have taken place outside the Gates of Heavenly Peace for centuries. Not even the most significant, shocking, or most impactful event in Tiananmen Square history.

The May 1919 protests were far more history-overturning; 1979 demonstrations much more organic and rooted in genuine 'democratic' reform; Falun Gong self-immolations and Uighur terrorist attacks in Tiananmen generated much greater public reaction.

The BIGGEST takeaway from TS89 obsession comes from the West, and how they have zealously attempted to turn TS89 into a perpetual color revolution, a branded event, and a traveling circus.

Memory politics involves manipulating collective memory, particularly around tragic events, to serve specific political agendas. This can include creating a cult of remembrance that focuses on death to evoke strong emotional responses, such as outrage and the desire for retribution.

This manipulation of memory is dangerous. It leads to a distorted understanding of history, as the focus on suffering obscures the most important dimensions and implications of the events of TS89.

It's crucial for us to critically engage with these narratives, to understand the political agendas behind them, and to seek out a more balanced understanding of history. This can help prevent the manipulation of memory for political gain and hault attempts to instigate senseless violence and chaos.

These next few days Western media will be flooded with remembrance of TS89, claiming the "CCP" wants to suppress information and discussion. In reality, it is those pushing carefully crafted narratives full of emotion and zero substance, with no critical analysis or debate, no integrity for detail, and zero discourse much less a commitment to the democratic process, that ultimately silence democratic discussion of TS89.

I'll share as much evidence and insightful information on TS89 as I possibly can. I look forward to good faith public open debate on social media.

But let me cut to the chase and share my conclusion: 1989 Tiananmen Square "revivalists" and "re-enactment activists" are, in my estimation, well financed terrorists. They are the world's longest-running color revolution and the most undemocratic and extreme cult of victimhood targeting East Asia and the Chinese diaspora.

And now we have proof they are backed by the U.S. Asia Pacific Command and the U.S. Secretary of State!

#TiananmenSquare89 #MemoryPolitics #ColorRevolution

[Peter Cronau @PeterCronau]

Haha, hilarious.
The con is exposed!

The whole #AUKUS scam is now stripped bare.

It has always been a con to enable the US to get its hands on more Australian territory for their US military bases.

Bases for their subs, ships, bombers, marines, drones, spy bases, weapons storage, and getting an extra flag for their forced anti-China alliance.

Australia has been conned big time — and was taken there by a pack of traitorous collaborators. You know who I mean.

#AUKUS is dead in the water — but the occupation of Australia continues.

@ICAN_australia
@NuclearBan
@IPAusNet
@WagePeaceAU
@BaseWatchAU
@OzAntiBases
@MAPW_Australia @WarPowersReform @DeclassifiedAus

https://t.co/gXctg1HYKP

[Laurent Michelon Officiel @LH_86_]

We "conveyed the wrong impression" on one "detail" : for 37 years we demonized China by putting the word "massacre" next to "Tiananmen", although there was no massacre.

That's one hell of a detail !

Shouldn't there be reparations to pay for medias who consistently conveyed a "wrong impression" that was so damaging to a country's reputation and to its leadership ?

[Paweł Wargan @pawelwargan]

Imperialists keep having to invent socialist massacres to deflect from the reality that capitalism is one continuous, world-spanning genocide.

We often hear about the 140 people who died trying to cross the Berlin Wall over a period spanning 28 years. But we never hear about the 9,900 people who die every single day because they lack access to healthcare — a direct outcome of imperialism's denial of sovereignty to the global periphery.

We often hear about some number of people who supposedly died at Tiananmen Square in 1989 — a highly-contested narrative. But we do not hear about the 1,545 people who die every single day because of Western sanctions — 38 million people in total over a fifty year period.

Given the sheer barbarism of the imperialist world system, we should marvel at how mild the actions of socialist and revolutionary projects are by the standards of the systemic and unrelenting violence they are forced to confront. And there is certainly no need for progressive forces to be apologetic or ashamed about these measures.

[Carl Zha @CarlZha]

Tank Man photographer describing how violence started on the night of June 3rd, 1989 during the Tiananmen protest;

[A.C. Carpenter @_AC_Carpenter_]

@MAGA53826 @zhao_dashuai Page A20 of the Vancouver Sun on September 17th, 1992: “The Central Intelligence Agency had sources among [Tiananmen Square] protesters.”, and, “For months before [the protests], the CIA had been helping student activists form the anti-government movement.”

[Zhao DaShuai 东北进修🇨🇳 Commentary @zhao_dashuai]

The photographer who took the famous "Tank Man" photo, describes how and who started the violence during the June 4th Tiananmen incident.

[Larry 長祥 @jambuki888]

Tiananmen Square Anniversary.

Colour revolution? Decide for yourself with the following clips I have compiled.

Eyewitnesses from Taiwan.
Protest leader Chai Ling calls for blood but ends up in a cushy position in America.
Lesser seen footage at the end.

Even Western reporters do not have a consensus on the this event.

If you look into the evidence, you will find many of the images don’t hold water under scrutiny.

The images of the supposed deceased only work in quick flash compilations, commonly used in Anti China Propaganda.

[K.L @kinglinzhuhui]

1989,One of the leaders of the student movement: "We were hoping to see bloodshed. Unfortunately, none occurred. I’m utterly disappointed in these people." This individual is now living in the United States.

[Warwick Powell | 鲍韶山 @baoshaoshan]

@Reuters It’s increasingly apparent that it was a U.S.-inspired “colour revolution” that failed. And that’s the truth widely understood. Now, when will Lai call on the Japanese to atone for their atrocities on the mainland, on the island province & across SE Asia?

[K.L @kinglinzhuhui]

1989, three leaders of the student movement：We were in the square the whole time and didn’t see any massacre. Do we really need to use lies to defeat the enemy?

[Peter Cronau @PeterCronau]

These words should be carved in stone on the steps to the Australian War Memorial.

To be recalled and recited by every visitor to that sad mausoleum.

They neatly sum up the state of the US Alliance with Australia:

“And I want to thank that fella down under. Thank you, pal. Appreciate it.”

A brief history of Australia eating shit on AUKUS
via @crikey_news https://t.co/d9c0YQLboW