I've written many times about how one of the most damaging long-term consequences of the current administration may be the loss of the ability to negotiate and make demands of China. By simultaneously allowing China to sit in the driver's seat for the North Korean six-party while frittering away our own resources in Iraq, the Bush administration has done more to embolden the Chinese than any president since Nixon.
That said, the People's Daily today came out with a scathing review of the US's role in the Lebanese-Hizbullah-Israel crisis, one that deserves notice both for its harsh language and for its allegations.
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Some commentators have pointed out that to reform mid-east countries has been a long term strategy for the Bush administration...[T]he current Israeli-Lebanon war has been treated as a good opportunity for the US to create a new mid-east situation with the Israeli military cannon. As for Lebanese civilians, the US has seen this as the pain one must experience before the birth of the new mid-east.
Thus Uncle Sam not only doesn't want to extinguish the fire, but on the contrary, it will give some fuel to it.
Since Hezbollah has used guerrilla war and tunnel war strategy to deal with Israeli bombing, Israeli cannon didn't seem to be very effective. Israel asked help from the US to provide it with advanced bombs with greater destruction. Uncle Sam immediately agreed without any hesitation. On July 22, 100 strong GBU-28 laser-guided and satellite-guided bombs were sent to the Israeli army. With the US connivance, Israel wantonly escalated the flames of war with Lebanon. On July 25, the UN observer sentry in Lebanon was "precisely" hit by the Israeli missile, four UN observers died.
Of course, one of those observers was Chinese, and we know about the American record of finding a way to
bomb Chinese in conflicts far away from the Middle Kingdom. Now China is noting that the bombs used to hit the UN were probably the very same "precise" ordinance used to bomb the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.
Is China accusing the US of a conspiracy to kill UN soliders? Not really. But the PD puts the possibility out there.
China really puts the screws on here:
What does it mean to be a responsible power? The US doesn't care its responsibility here, it is also irresponsible. But on the other hand, it demands other countries be responsible. Uncle Sam thinks North Korean nuclear test is irresponsible, Iranian uranium enrichment is irresponsible and Russia is irresponsible as it intervened in the colored revolution in the eastern European countries. As an old Chinese saying goes, if you don't want it yourself, don't give it to others. It is time for Uncle Sam to ask itself, 'what does it mean to be a responsible country?' How can you be a responsible country?
In other words, don't count on our support in North Korea, with Iran, and with Russia.
Don't get me wrong, I don't support China or particularly look forward to a future where China plays a role as big as the current American one. As a nation that routinely oppresses its citizens, prohibits all but state-sanctioned religion, is routinely belligerent to its neighbors, and possess a terrible record on environmental policies, China represents everything that is wrong with the Bush Administration. And that's why the Bush Administration's biggest failure will be the very creation of a future that no sane American would want.