Re: EJ & China

[Bertil Haggman <bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se>]

Richard Brem wrote:

> So Hongkong has become Chinese ... On the occasion of the British handover
> of HK to China I want to draw your attention to an interview that Ernst
> Juenger gave to the German newspaper "Welt am Sonntag" on  31 December 1978.
> 
> The interview starts with the following question: "Wie lautet Ihre Prognose
> fuer das 21. Jahrhundert?" ["What's your prognosis for the 21st century?"]
> And Juenger answers: "Das 21. Jahrhundert wird mexikanisch und chinesisch
> sein. Ich meine, machtmaessig werden die Chinesen sehr zunehmen: durch ihren
> Fleiss, ihr Organisations- talent, ihre Zahl." ["The 21st century will be
> Mexican and Chinese. I mean in terms of power the Chinese will become very
> important,
> because of their assiduity, their organizational talent, their number."]
> (With "Mexican" Juenger refers to sacred drugs)
> 
> In Juenger's utopian novel "Eumeswil", published in 1977, the Chinese seem
> to play an important role as well. As always Juenger is not explicit, but
> prefers to drop hints: he introduces the character of Kung, a cook, who is
> attached to Martin (Manuel) Venator at the Casbah; and he mentions the
> Yellow Khan at several occasions, who seems to be some sort of global power.
> 
> In one of the last paragraphs of the chapter "Ein Tag in der Stadt"
> ("A Day in the City") Venator talks about his affection for chess:
> "Der Genuss ist archaisch; ich bewege die Bauern und Offiziere,
> den hurtigen Laeufer, den listigen Springer, den maechtigen Elefanten, den
> Koenig, den Vezier."
> Now, I'm no expert in chess, but the elephant and the vizier seem to
> symbolize some major cultural change here. I think I've heard somewhere that
> the Chinese play their own version of chess with some of the pieces being
> different. I think I've heard they use elephants instead of rooks, but I
> might be completely wrong. Maybe some of the list members know more about
> this.
> Btw, Joachim Neugroschel in his 1993 translation of the book has
> left out the "elephant" and the "vizier"; he translated them as "the
> powerful rook" and "the queen" (p. 364 of the UK edition).
> I don't know, I think Juenger tried to indicate something here and
> Neugroschel should have sticked more to the original text.
> 
> Anyway, if Juenger is right with his prognosis then we should get accustomed
> to the prospect of a dramatically increased Chinese hegemony over large
> parts of the world. Has anyone read Humphrey Hawksley's and Simon
> Holberton's "Dragonstrike: The Millenium War" yet? Juenger would probably
> like it a lot. 

Thanks for an interesting and timely contribution to the list. As always
EJ is right. My humble opinion is that PRCs power is growing and it is
ominous that the Chinese leadership is calling on Taiwan to accept a
Hong Kong solution already to-day.

Hawksley-Holberton is supposed to do for PRC what General Sir John
Hackett
did for the Soviet Union with _The Third World War - The Untold Story_
in
1982. Don't forget R.Bernstein - R.Munro, _The Coming Comflict with
China_ (1997). The authors claim, rightly so, I believe, that China is
an "unsatisfied and ambitious power whose goal it is to dominate Asia".
A modernized navy and air force could dominate the South China Sea and 
blockade Taiwan. The United States might then be forced to fight for
the Taiwanese. Otherwise the Asian allies will loose confidence in the
west.

But if the United States forestalls a Chinese domination it might not
come to war.
Don't forget Huntington and the prognosis of cultural conflict. A PRC
allied
to the Muslim world could certainly pose a danger to the west. But China
has many weaknesses: only the coastal zones are so far developed,
communication and infrastructure is weak, and large parts of the
interior
are still an underdeveloped country. 

Not being a chess expert I cannot say anything about the chess analysis
but it sounds interesting. 

"...China and the United States will be adversaries in the major global
rivalry of the first decades of the century. Compertition between them
will force other countries to take sides and will involve all the
standard
elements of international competition: military strength, economic
well-being, influence among other nations and over the values and
practices that are
accepted as international norms". So Bernstein - Munro.

Oswald Spengler predicted that a culture that once was burnt out could
never be revived. But a cyclical scheme like the one underneath might
not be wholly impossible:

1000 - 1500    First Chinese Far Eastern Cycle
1500 - 2050 (?)First European Far Western Cycle
2050 -   ?     Second Chinese Far Eastern Cycle

Wonder what EJ would say ? Or what is Richards reaction ?

Greetings

Bertil Haggman
bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se