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China has never been able to interfere in 'distant' nations. The Europeans were the first to truly develop navies capable of projecting force at such great dis
by hiram112 9y ago
China has never been able to interfere in 'distant' nations.
The Europeans were the first to truly develop navies capable of projecting force at such great distances, beginning in the Renaissance period, and everyone else has been playing catch-up.
By your logic, the Romans or Greeks or ancient Egyptians were a peace-loving peoples because they didn't bother China much either.
But if you look at what was possible, based on the technological capabilities at the time, China has never been as peaceful as they constantly claim. Just ask any of their neighbors, many of whom have explicitly created defense pacts with the US and the West because of historical fear of an aggressive China.
Note I'm not trying to say the West deserves any trust. But based on China's history and its current behavior as it does become more capable, combined with the constant Chinese PR about their 'peaceful rise', I'm not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
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- fsloth 9y agoActually Chinese had much more capable maritime technology than europe in the 1500's but their emperor said he did not approve of such silly business as voyages of discovery so they just stopped doing that. To China's rulers, trade and profit were facets of internal politics, and not an end in themselves. "as the Confucian bureaucracy under the next emperor reversed the policy of open exploration and by 1500, it became a capital offence to build a seagoing junk with more than two masts."[0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_exploration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_exploration
- hiram112 9y agoI am certainly aware of the 'Treasure Voyages' and China's abilities up through the Ming dynasty. China was indeed able to travel, trade, and exploit foreign nations at limited distance, but never on a scale as the Europeans from the 16th century onward. This is also documented: https://www.amazon.com/Civilization-West-Rest-Niall-Ferguson-ebook/dp/B0054TVW04 https://www.amazon.com/Civilization-West-Rest-Niall-Ferguson....
- vilmosi 9y agoYou're just talking about different time periods. But when talking about "ability" to influence distant nations, having a bigger and better ship than Columbus at the time kind of means they had the ability. [0] They just didn't care about finding another route to India for spices or mining some distant silver mountain. They already had those. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He
- chibg10 9y agoThey "didn't care to" because the Ming dynasty rulers felt that China was culturally, technologically, and economically superior to all other nations, and thought cutting China off was the best way to preserve that. Obviously, that turned out to be a total failure of a policy as China was rapidly surpassed by the West over the next several centuries and is still catching up today I'm not sure how that provides any guidance on how a CCP-led China would handle foreign policy in a completely different era though. This whole discussion seems sort of pointless to me.
- vilmosi 9y ago>>> Ming dynasty rulers felt that China was culturally, technologically, and economically superior to all other nations They most likely were at that time. >>> Obviously, that turned out to be a total failure of a policy as China was rapidly surpassed by the West over the next several centuries and is still catching up today You don't know that. Maybe expanding beyond your means for no good economic reason would have been a bad idea? And the reason they're catching up today has little to do with that decision. The industrial revolution or the enlightenment didn't happen because Columbus discovered America. >>> This whole discussion seems sort of pointless to me Agreed.
- oblio 9y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_voyages https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_voyages