China lets the West in on a secret
With its manned space flight, Beijing announces that it plans to compete, not comply, says GEOFFREY YORK
By GEOFFREY YORK
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Within two hours of China's historic manned space launch this week, Chinese authorities were already inviting journalists to a press conference to boast of even more ambitious dreams for the future.
The first Chinese astronaut, Lieutenant-Colonel Yang Liwei, had not even returned to Earth -- he had only just begun the second of 14 scheduled orbits of the Earth when the faxed invitations began arriving in media offices across Beijing -- yet the Chinese were already confident enough to begin preparing the announcement of their next space plans.
At the press conference, shortly after Col. Yang had safely landed, Chinese space engineers disclosed a detailed vision of the future: another launch of a manned space flight within the next one or two years, followed by further space missions to practise the art of spacewalking and orbital docking between two space capsules, and then a permanently inhabited space station in orbit around Earth.
Although they didn't confirm it this time, the Chinese dream goes beyond that. It includes a mission to the moon, a lunar colony and even a manned flight to Mars. It would take China up to the limits of human exploration and beyond, into uncharted territory.
It is a remarkable agenda, a declaration that no frontier cannot be conquered, that nothing for the Chinese is impossible any more. Scientists may debate the benefits of the Chinese space program, researchers may study its crop-seed experiments, and Pentagon analysts may ponder the military implications, but the most-significant consequence of this week's manned space flight is the political statement that it sends to the world.
Until recently, China was content with a humble role on the world stage, focusing on economic growth and internal stability. When some countries suggested that China should be invited to join the Group of Eight, which represents the leading industrialized nations, China always modestly declined. It insisted that it was still merely a developing nation, even though the large size of China's economy would certainly justify its membership in the G8.
In the past two years, however, China has begun to strut its stuff, flexing its muscles to grab the spotlight and wield influence on a variety of strategic issues. The manned space mission is just the culmination of this trend.
It could be argued that the shift began with two historic events in 2001. The first was China's entry into the World Trade Organization, which symbolized the end of its economic isolation. The second was Beijing's successful bid for the 2008 Summer Olympics, which symbolized the end of its political isolation.
Since those twin events, China has moved quickly to take a more active and assertive role in international relations. It has appointed an envoy to the Middle East to search for a uniquely Chinese contribution to the peace process. It has assumed a leading role on the Korean Peninsula as the organizer of the six-nation diplomatic negotiations on the North Korean nuclear crisis. It showed willingness to defy the United States at the UN Security Council, joining with France and Russia to prevent the United Nations from endorsing the U.S.-led war on Iraq. It rejected U.S. demands on its currency, refusing to allow the yuan to be revalued despite intense U.S. pressure. It even agreed to participate at the G8 summit this year, although it continues to refuse to be an official member.
In this context, China's first manned space mission is a clear signal of its willingness to blaze an independent path, regardless of the financial costs.
If it had followed the route of Japan and the Western European nations, China would have sought a limited role in the U.S.-led international space station instead of developing its own independent space program. Japan, Britain and France, for example, all have the technological capacity to develop a program to launch a human into space, yet they preferred to join the international station. China was not invited to join the international station (largely because of U.S. fears that China would steal the secrets of its space technology), yet the reality is that it prefers an independent route anyway.
Implicit in all of this is China's geopolitical ambition to challenge the West, rather than merely to join Western clubs as a junior member. World leaders are too polite to say it, yet they are fully aware that China is expanding its influence across Asia and developing a self-sufficiency in its scientific and military technology. With a 5,000-year-old civilization behind it, China can afford to take the long view. It expects that its economy will quadruple in size over the next 20 years. By the middle of this century, it could be ready to compete with the United States in the next frontier of military weaponry: satellite-based space systems.
For more than a century, China has worried that it was too backward to compete with the Western nations that dominated Asia. This psychology, this fear of inferiority, has supplied the psychological motivation for its drive for technological advances. It seeks to recapture its glory days of past centuries, when it invented gunpowder and rockets -- the forerunners of today's space vessels.
After the Communist revolution, Mao Tsetung proclaimed that China was finally "standing up" -- no longer on its knees, no longer bowed in submission to other countries. After the space mission this week, patriotic Chinese commentators had an updated version of this slogan. Instead of standing up, they said, China is now flying up.
With its huge population and its booming economy, along with its vast ambitions, this Chinese ascent could be faster than the West can anticipate.
With its manned space flight, Beijing announces that it plans to compete, not comply, says GEOFFREY YORK
By GEOFFREY YORK
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Within two hours of China's historic manned space launch this week, Chinese authorities were already inviting journalists to a press conference to boast of even more ambitious dreams for the future.
The first Chinese astronaut, Lieutenant-Colonel Yang Liwei, had not even returned to Earth -- he had only just begun the second of 14 scheduled orbits of the Earth when the faxed invitations began arriving in media offices across Beijing -- yet the Chinese were already confident enough to begin preparing the announcement of their next space plans.
At the press conference, shortly after Col. Yang had safely landed, Chinese space engineers disclosed a detailed vision of the future: another launch of a manned space flight within the next one or two years, followed by further space missions to practise the art of spacewalking and orbital docking between two space capsules, and then a permanently inhabited space station in orbit around Earth.
Although they didn't confirm it this time, the Chinese dream goes beyond that. It includes a mission to the moon, a lunar colony and even a manned flight to Mars. It would take China up to the limits of human exploration and beyond, into uncharted territory.
It is a remarkable agenda, a declaration that no frontier cannot be conquered, that nothing for the Chinese is impossible any more. Scientists may debate the benefits of the Chinese space program, researchers may study its crop-seed experiments, and Pentagon analysts may ponder the military implications, but the most-significant consequence of this week's manned space flight is the political statement that it sends to the world.
Until recently, China was content with a humble role on the world stage, focusing on economic growth and internal stability. When some countries suggested that China should be invited to join the Group of Eight, which represents the leading industrialized nations, China always modestly declined. It insisted that it was still merely a developing nation, even though the large size of China's economy would certainly justify its membership in the G8.
In the past two years, however, China has begun to strut its stuff, flexing its muscles to grab the spotlight and wield influence on a variety of strategic issues. The manned space mission is just the culmination of this trend.
It could be argued that the shift began with two historic events in 2001. The first was China's entry into the World Trade Organization, which symbolized the end of its economic isolation. The second was Beijing's successful bid for the 2008 Summer Olympics, which symbolized the end of its political isolation.
Since those twin events, China has moved quickly to take a more active and assertive role in international relations. It has appointed an envoy to the Middle East to search for a uniquely Chinese contribution to the peace process. It has assumed a leading role on the Korean Peninsula as the organizer of the six-nation diplomatic negotiations on the North Korean nuclear crisis. It showed willingness to defy the United States at the UN Security Council, joining with France and Russia to prevent the United Nations from endorsing the U.S.-led war on Iraq. It rejected U.S. demands on its currency, refusing to allow the yuan to be revalued despite intense U.S. pressure. It even agreed to participate at the G8 summit this year, although it continues to refuse to be an official member.
In this context, China's first manned space mission is a clear signal of its willingness to blaze an independent path, regardless of the financial costs.
If it had followed the route of Japan and the Western European nations, China would have sought a limited role in the U.S.-led international space station instead of developing its own independent space program. Japan, Britain and France, for example, all have the technological capacity to develop a program to launch a human into space, yet they preferred to join the international station. China was not invited to join the international station (largely because of U.S. fears that China would steal the secrets of its space technology), yet the reality is that it prefers an independent route anyway.
Implicit in all of this is China's geopolitical ambition to challenge the West, rather than merely to join Western clubs as a junior member. World leaders are too polite to say it, yet they are fully aware that China is expanding its influence across Asia and developing a self-sufficiency in its scientific and military technology. With a 5,000-year-old civilization behind it, China can afford to take the long view. It expects that its economy will quadruple in size over the next 20 years. By the middle of this century, it could be ready to compete with the United States in the next frontier of military weaponry: satellite-based space systems.
For more than a century, China has worried that it was too backward to compete with the Western nations that dominated Asia. This psychology, this fear of inferiority, has supplied the psychological motivation for its drive for technological advances. It seeks to recapture its glory days of past centuries, when it invented gunpowder and rockets -- the forerunners of today's space vessels.
After the Communist revolution, Mao Tsetung proclaimed that China was finally "standing up" -- no longer on its knees, no longer bowed in submission to other countries. After the space mission this week, patriotic Chinese commentators had an updated version of this slogan. Instead of standing up, they said, China is now flying up.
With its huge population and its booming economy, along with its vast ambitions, this Chinese ascent could be faster than the West can anticipate.
