In part one, I used America’s 1823 Monroe Doctrine to show that similar reasoning was behind Mao’s decision to send the People’s Liberation Army (PLO) into Korea to fight the United States and UN.
I want to point out that China has never been a military threat to the United States, but America, Japan, Russia, Germany, Britain, France, and other countries have attacked China in the past two centuries and the cost in Chinese lives may have been as high as 100 million or more.
The embedded video says that soon after US troops entered Korea to fight the North’s invading army that if support didn’t arrive soon, the war would be short.
It was obvious that the United Nations was losing the race against time as North Korean troops put pressure on the small area behind the Naktong River near Pusan that US and United Nations troops held.
By August of 1950, the US 8th army was spread too thin. The situation looked bad.
General Walton H. Walker was the field commander of the US 8th army. During World War II, he had been one of General George S. Patton’s Army Corps commanders and was a no nonsense Texan. On July 29, he told his subordinates if I ever see you back here again it had better be in a coffin.
The only advantage the US 8th Army had was firepower. The battle raged for weeks over hills that changed hands often. After two weeks of brutal fighting, US troops managed to hold and strengthen the line.
This provided time for the United Nations to send in troops, which arrived in the port of Pusan from countries such as France, Turkey, Thailand, Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Ethiopia.
Most of the new troops were young and were not seasoned veterans.
Then on December 1, 1950, the North Korean Army launched a final assault. However, the North Koreans were exhausted and could not sustain the fight.
General Douglas MacArthur, commander of all UN forces, decided to land an invasion force behind the North Korean lines at Inchon.
Seoul, the captured South Korean Capital was twenty-five miles from Inchon. It was a risky venture but MacArthur was confident of success.
Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
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While searching Google for a Monroe Doctrine link, I stumbled onPCMS Social Studies and a post that appeared January 20, 2011.
Quote: “The Monroe Doctrine was put in place on December 2, 1823 by (President) James Monroe…. He did not want European Countries coming back and taking over the United States…. I know that I would definitely not want someone telling me I have to change the way I believe.”
China’s reaction was the same in 1950 when the People’s Liberation Army entered the Korean War.
Because Korea sat precariously between China, Russia and Japan, Korea had always been at the mercy of its bigger neighbors. For centuries, those nations had fought each other in Korea.
As World War II was ending, in July 1945, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin used his troops in coordination with the US to force the Japanese out of Korea. The Soviet and US armies met at the 38th parallel and agreed to divide Korea along that line.
The Soviets would control the northern half of Korea and the US the south.
While Soviet Russia and America were dividing the spoils of war in Europe and Asia, China was involved in a bloody civil war between the Communist and Nationalist Parties that would last until 1949
Prior to Japan occupying Korea in 1900, Korea had been a tributary state of China for centuries. However, China was in no shape to protest what Russia and the US was doing in Korea.
Two years later, the super powers left Korea leaving behind a Communist state in the north and a capitalist republic in the south ruled by a Korean authoritarian dictator educated at America’s Princeton University.
On June 5, 1950 at 4:00 AM, the Korean War started when North Korea declared war and invaded South Korea by land and sea.
Since the US had deprived South Korea of weapons and ammunition in fear that the south might invade the north and start a war, the North Korean army met little resistance.
The US strategy of restraint had backfired. South Korea had no weapons to defend itself. In two days, Seoul, the capital of South Korea fell to the invading army.
North Korea counted on America doing nothing. However, the majority of Americans in the US was outraged and demanded action, which caused President Truman to send in the United States air force while the US Navy bombarded Korea from the sea.
On July 19, 1950, President Truman called on the United Nations to act quickly and stop the aggression of Communist North Korea.
In the beginning, the US army was weak and far from Korea mostly in Europe. The huge American army that won World War II in 1945 had been disbanded resulting in a much smaller force.
In early July, 1950, an American brigade entered Korea and fought North Korean troops thirty miles south of South Korea’s captured capital of Seoul. The first battle didn’t go well for the US.
Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
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The Yuan-Xiao Festival, which isalso known as the Lantern Festival or the Sweet Dumpling Festival, arrives this time of year.
China Online.com says, “Chinese started to celebrate the Lantern Festival during the Han Dynasty (206 BC to 221 AD) then it regained popularity during the Tang and Song Dynasties.”
Yuan Xiao (元宵节 or 元宵節) is an ancient Chinese tradition that celebrates a new beginning and a fresh start on life.
This is a festival for people to have fun. On the night, people go to streets with a variety of lanterns under the full moon, watching Lion or Dragon Dances, playing Chinese riddles and games, enjoying the typical food called Yuan Xiao (sweet dumplings) and setting off firecrackers.
The sweet dumplings are made of glutinous rice flour and may be stuffed with either a sweet or a salty filling. Sweet fillings may have walnuts, sesame seeds, osmanthus flowers, rose petals, tangerine peel, bean paste or jujube paste.
The salty Yuan Xiao is filled with a minced meat and/or vegetable mixture.
Traditionally, this day marks the end of celebrations of the Lunar New Year.
Lighting paper lanterns is a tradition during this festival, which is why it is also known as the Lantern Festival. The Lantern Festival was once a version of another Chinese Valentine’s Day but has been gradually losing its romantic allure while the Western Valentine’s Day is gaining in popularity among younger Chinese.
If you pay attention to Chinese holidays, eating is important. China is an eating culture where family and friends gather to stuff themselves and have an enjoyable time.
Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.
Shakespeare’s drama Romeo and Juliet is often taught to ninth graders in US high schools. Other Shakespeare plays are studied at other grade levels and in college.
However, you may be surprised to discover Shakespeare is probably more popular in China since his work is taught in most Chinese universities, both in English and in Chinese and Shakespearean texts are easily available in China in both languages.
When Mao ruled China (1949 to 1976), Shakespeare was banned as was Aristotle and other Western philosophers. Mao died in 1976. That ban was lifted in 1978.
In fact, according to Zhaoxiang Cheng, the author of Teaching Shakespeare in China, “It is no exaggeration to say that every educated Chinese knows something about Shakespeare.”
However, when produced in China on stage, the plot may not stay true to the original Shakespeare.
Writing for the The People’s Republic of Shakespeare, Adventures in Chinese Research, Meammi says, “My interest in this topic started when I noticed that many of the Romeo and Juliets performed in China are either parodies or rewrites where one of the lovers survives in the end.
“China has their own pair of star-crossed lovers (The Peony Pavilion – 1598 AD), who tragically die for love and their plight is described in a much more mournful tone than Shakespeare’s version.
“Some Chinese theatre companies state in interviews that their audiences have too much sadness in their lives so Romeo just can’t die in the end of their performance.”
Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.
Gillian Wong writes, “The persisting suspicions about Qian’s death reflect a growing lack of trust in China’s government as rampant corruption and official abuse erode public confidence.”
The language Wong uses to place blame bothers me. What she writes assumes that China’s central government has total control over everything that happens in China, which it doesn’t. China is about the size of the United States with five times the population and most police work and governing takes place at the local level as in the US.
In fact, China couldn’t join the World Trade Organization in December 2001 without having a legal system similar to most Western democracies, which means this issue of a rural village leader being murdered over a land grab has to be dealt with by China’s infant legal system guided by the laws of China as such a crime would be dealt with in America under US laws.
This means criminals often go free as in the US. If the evidence and witnesses do not exist, no one is punished. The old days of Chinese officials rounding up the accused and executing them without evidence and a proper trial are supposed to be over.
For example, in 1973, Al Pacino played the part of an honest New York cop, Frank Serpico, who blew the whistle on corruption in the city police force only to have his comrades in police uniforms turn against him. Pacino’s movie was based on a true story.
The US even has a witness protection program to protect the lives of innocent people from criminals that want to erase all evidence against them even if it means murdering witnesses
I’ve written about corruption in China before and what is being done about it. What the West considers corruption in China and all of Asia was a way of life for several thousand years. The old ways of doing things do not change instantly just because a foreign legal system and new laws are created.
To allow this new legal system to work, the slow wheels of justice must be allowed to turn and that doesn’t guarantee that justice will be served. If you believe China is doing nothing about crime and corruption, learn from Bo Xilai’s 32 Million.
Another American movie, Walking Tall, was also based on the true story of honest Tennessee sheriff Buford Pusser, who almost single-handily cleaned up his small town of crime and corruption, but at a horrible price, and he nearly lost his life as Serpico did.
No, I cannot blame that rural village leader’s death on China’s central government, and I cannot expect Beijing to send in the teenage Red Guard goon squad, which doesn’t exist anymore, as Mao would have done during the Cultural Revolution to punish everyone accused of a crime, even innocent people, without evidence as defined by China’s new legal system.
Gillian Wong also says, “Qian’s death is the latest violent incident to touch a nerve among the Chinese public, angry over official corruption and abuse of power, including unfair seizure of farmers’ land for development…”
Wong’s statements make it sound as if the land belongs to the farmers. It doesn’t.
After all, the land the farmers worked belongs to the collective and the government but not individuals. In fact, even the title to urban homes individuals buy in cities clearly says that all the land belongs to the government. It’s more of a long-term lease than owning land.
How do you measure fair compensation of land that never legally belonged to the farmers in the first place?
Before 1949, most rural land belonged to wealthy landowners. In fact, the ancestors of the peasant farmers working the land today were tenant farmers that paid a rent of some sort to the real landowners, who often abused the peasants.
After winning the Chinese civil war, Mao had many of the original landowners executed for supposed crimes against those peasants. There were no fair trials. The peasants complained and the Communists executed the accused.
Correct me if you have other “facts”, but most of China’s farmers have worked the land free for about sixty years with no rent, no mortgage and no property tax.
As for murder, with a Western style legal system and no witnesses willing to step forward, there is no case. The main character of My Splendid Concubine wrote in one of his journals that in China the innocent were often punished along with the guilty while in England the criminals often went free and there was no justice for the victims.
If what Robert Hart wrote in the 19th century was true, then it seems Western justice has arrived in China. Maybe China’s central government needs to start a Western style witness protection program if they don’t have one yet.
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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.
If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.
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