Well, the hard truth is that there are hard line factions in both the US and China that would love to have the two countries at each others' throats in utter hostility. Safire and Buckley are certainly part of that faction in the US. Buckley, of course, has always been in that faction, being a part of the old "China Lobby" that was associated with Chiang Kai-Shek back in the 1950s. Barkley Rosser -----Original Message----- From: Wojtek Sokolowski <sokol at jhu.edu> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Date: Monday, May 17, 1999 2:54 PM Subject: Re: China should apologize to the US
>At 12:22 PM 5/17/99 -0400, Henry C.K. Liu wrote:
>>It is views like Safire's and Buckley's that justify Chinese anger.
>>And such views are not in the minority in America at this moment.
>>If the right wing thinks it's to America's interest to make China an
>>enemy, they will success and may not live to regret it, along with the
>>rest of us.
>
>
>henry, I think you take these two clowns too seriously. What they say
>should be viewed as a Dennis The Menace's fart - there is no meaning in it
>other than obnoxious behavior designed to piss the target audience.
>
>Just open the window, let the stench out, and forget the whole incidient.
>
>wojtek
>
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>>Henry C.K. Liu
>>
>>May 17, 1999 New York Times
>>
>>
>> ESSAY / By WILLIAM SAFIRE
>>
>> Cut the Apologies
>>
>>
>> After a week of whipping up hatred of Americans by accusing
>>us of deliberately murdering Chinese journalists in Belgrade, President
>>Jiang Zemin deigned to accept a call from The Great Apologizer.
>>
>> For the fifth time, President Clinton apologized, expressed
>> regrets, sent condolences, kowtowed and groveled, begging
>> to be believed that we did not bomb China's embassy on
>> purpose.
>>
>> But it is America that is owed an apology. After an accident
>> of war, we have been falsely accused of killing Chinese with
>> malice aforethought. That is a great insult, compounded by
>> the calculated trashing of our embassy by a bused-in mob
>> encouraged by police.
>>
>> The truth is that Beijing's leaders, worried about
>> demonstrations on the 10th anniversary next month of their
>> Tiananmen massacre, are milking this mistake for all it is
>> worth.
>>
>> By lying about our intent and suppressing coverage of our
>> prompt admission of error, the nervous rulers are diverting
>> their people's anger toward us and away from themselves.
>>
>> By demanding we investigate the accident, they seek to
>> water down the current Congressional investigations of their
>> nuclear spying -- a series of penetrations of our laboratories
>> and political campaigns that was no accident.
>>
>> By making Clinton beg forgiveness, they are able to cancel
>> human rights talks while extracting new trade concessions.
>> The deal: they will accept Clinton's apologies when he caves
>> in on their application to the World Trade Organization.
>>
>> No wonder that no reputable diplomat would accept the
>> President's pleas to replace our fed-up ambassador in
>> Beijing. Clinton is now trying to appoint an admiral whose
>> amiable association with the Chinese military and U.S. arms
>> contractors will be closely examined by the Senate.
>>
>> Though Clinton is softer than ever on China, he's taken a
>> hard line in resisting Congress's investigations into Beijing's
>> penetration of our nuclear labs and our political process. His
>> latest trick: the improper use of documents submitted for
>> intelligence declassification to prepare advance refutations of
>> evidence of security lapses.
>>
>> The White House has delayed for four months the
>> three-volume report on security laxity by the House select
>> committee headed by Representative Chris Cox. Clinton
>> spinners are already distributing a packet of reprints of
>> derogations by offended scientists, China-defenders and
>> favorite journalists.
>>
>> Cox has used the "clearance" delay to rewrite the turgid
>> prose and to enliven the report with photographs and
>> diagrams showing what missiles and satellites were stolen;
>> that might even awaken television interest.
>>
>> The Senate Intelligence Committee, headed by Richard
>> Shelby and Robert Kerrey, is not about to hold still for the
>> abuse of clearance.
>>
>> After it submitted one of its reports on nuclear lab laxity for
>> review to protect intelligence sources, it learned of a
>> refutation of that bipartisan report in work by the National
>> Security Council response machine.
>>
>> The White House was told that the submission of documents
>> was for security clearance only. It was not to be used for (a)
>> advance policy review so that "rapid response" would occur
>> in the same news cycle as the reports' release, or for (b)
>> leakage of portions to the press for "inoculation" to later
>> reduce its impact as "old news."
>>
>> The intelligence business is not the publicity business.
>> National security reports are not to be equated with the Starr
>> report about hanky-panky. The Shelby committee made
>> plain to the Berger Rapid-Apology Center that if this
>> undermining of inter-branch comity did not stop forthwith,
>> "we're going to zero out the N.S.C. staff budget." (By
>> withholding some $15 million, Congress could force the
>> spinners onto the Department of Defense payroll or cause
>> agonizing layoffs in the White House basement.)
>>
>> In both House and Senate, bipartisan committees are
>> discovering serious intelligence weaknesses: too little analysis
>>
>> of too much collection. "If there's a flare-up in Iraq, North
>> Korea or the Andes," worries an investigator, "we could not
>> handle it and Kosovo, too."
>>
>> The most troubling breakdown is in counterespionage. The
>> F.B.I. and C.I.A., which are not blameless, are telling
>> Congress the weakest link is the Department of Justice.
>>
>> What began as corrupt political protection became dangerous
>> national security laxity. Who will apologize for that?
>>
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