A commenter asked me why I rarely talk about Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and the possibility of a China-Japan conflict if Japan intervenes over Taiwan. To be honest, I have always believed Japan is a powerful country, but it is completely irrelevant in any issue concerning China. What Japanese politicians think has almost zero influence on China because Japan is a dog kept on a steel chain by the United States. As long as the Americans do not let go of that chain, Japan can never bite China. Even if it somehow managed to bite, it would still just be a dog. China always keeps a big stick in its hand, and that stick is prepared for the United States. Hitting the dog with it would only be a side effect.
As for the Taiwan issue, let me still share my view. People see me as a loud and extreme keyboard warrior, a hardcore nationalist who must be desperate for national reunification and the recovery of Taiwan. The truth is that was the young me. The current me genuinely does not care when or whether Taiwan returns to China. Its importance to me is far less than how many questions my son got wrong on his exam. The people on Taiwan are not suffering in dire straits; they live quite well. Both sides of the strait are developing their economies and technology. When the time is ripe, reunification will happen naturally. Even if it is unified, I will not move there to live. Being confined to a small island feels boring. When I was young, driving more than twenty thousand kilometers in one trip was perfectly normal. I once drove alone from Guangdong back to Jiangsu, stopping only briefly at service areas. Taiwan simply cannot offer me that kind of space. So about unifying Taiwan, I don’t give a shit.
Yet I am, after all, a Chinese person. The Chinese nation has suffered endless humiliation in modern history and lost vast territories. As a victorious nation in World War II, China still lost huge pieces of land, including Outer Mongolia, and even Taiwan became separated from the mainland because of the civil war. Over the past few decades, China has worked hard to develop its economy, never started a single foreign war, and focused only on lifting people out of poverty, improving lives, building infrastructure, cleaning the environment, reducing emissions, and contributing to all humanity. Yet the kindness of the Chinese people has not earned the slightest goodwill from the world in return. Even Japan, a fascist country with grave historical crimes, now wants to meddle in China’s internal affairs and interfere over Taiwan. And the owner of that vicious dog, the United States, remains Taiwan’s biggest arms supplier.
Yes, the United States helped China during World War II. But America’s power was also built on the post-war order. China was like a laborer who helped the Americans build their prosperous farm. Even if they gave China none of the benefits, they should not come to rob China’s property. Taiwan is China’s property. It is Chinese territory, recognized by the Cairo Declaration, the Potsdam Proclamation, and United Nations resolutions. Now American politicians claim those UN resolutions can be interpreted differently, and the Japanese say they will intervene if something happens to Taiwan. If these countries refuse to honor the post-World War II order and UN resolutions, then the world has no rules left. A world without rules is a jungle, and in a jungle only the biggest fist matters. Why should we Chinese waste words with them? If they won’t follow the rules, we meet on the battlefield. It is that simple.
As a Chinese person, I am tired of being harassed by all kinds of international clowns. Even third-rate European countries thousands of miles away, like France and the Netherlands, dare to send warships through the Taiwan Strait. Do they have even the slightest basic respect for Chinese people? China paid the price of more than twenty million casualties to win World War II. Now they say that post-war order no longer counts and want a do-over. Fine, let us tear everything down and start again. We will see who ends up the victim. France surrendered after resisting just six weeks yet stole a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. It is already unworthy of that seat, and it still provokes China. They claim the European Union and Taiwan share democratic values. The European Union is just another dog of the United States. What values do you have? Your values were on display in Ukraine. Why didn’t you send troops there? In the minds of these clown countries, China is not as scary as the Soviet Union was. Let me tell them clearly: China’s strength far exceeds anything the Soviet Union ever had. If Western countries don’t believe it, let us all lay our cards on the table and fight it out once and for all. There is nothing more to say.
I am especially afraid of death, but I also believe people in Western countries are not made of iron. Look at their cowardly performance in the Ukraine war: dozens of countries together still cannot defeat Russia, yet they dare provoke China? Have they forgotten the Korean War? What was China’s national strength then, and what is it now?
I must declare that I am not a hardliner. I have no dream of superpower status and I am not a Han chauvinist. I simply believe Chinese people are human beings too. I can accept criticism from Americans; after all, they are the world’s sheriff, and China can give them some face. But only face. If they truly infringe on China, China will hit back. As for second- and third-rate countries like those in Europe and Japan, what the hell are you? What qualifications do you have to provoke China? Russia still occupies Japan’s Northern Territories. Do the Japanese dare demand them back? The Russians don’t warn; they just sink ships. Russia’s economy is roughly equal to one Chinese province like Guangdong or Jiangsu, and its weapons and technology lag behind China by who knows how many orders of magnitude, yet the West still dares not provoke it too far. If America’s dogs only respect those who beat them with a stick, then China will take out its stick and beat them, because they don’t want to be treated as equals and respected by China. They only understand China’s stick.
Therefore, regarding the Taiwan issue, I think Chinese people don’t need to discuss it endlessly. We just draw the red line clearly. When China has six aircraft carriers, we send one notice to the island: unify or fight. There is nothing left to discuss. Some will say the people on Taiwan are our compatriots and many support unification, so how can we just fight? Yes, if they truly see themselves as compatriots of the mainland, they will accept a peaceful proposal. Telling compatriots to lay down their weapons and push for unification is not shameful. If they fire on compatriots and refuse to surrender, then treat them as enemies and clean them up together.
As for the risk of US intervention, I want to ask: are all Americans supermen? Are they all Captain America? Are they not afraid of war? We already tested them in the Korean War. They are human too. Bullets make them bleed and die the same way. If they rob what belongs to China and Chinese people resist, yet they insist on using force, what is there to talk about with them?
Finally, toward a fascist country like Japan that has never reflected on its wars, China should impose harsh sanctions under the UN Charter and, when necessary, directly use military force. Never give the devil a chance to breathe. We must use force to ensure it can never again harm the world. On this point, I believe China and the United States actually share the same view.