(Essential Questions) Exclusive | Yu Ligong: What are the new changes in international conflicts in the post-Cold War era?
China News Service, Beijing, August 2nd. Title: Yu Ligong: What new changes have been made in international conflicts in the post-Cold War era?
China News Agency reporter Wan Shuyan
Since the end of the Cold War, the bipolar structure has collapsed, and the world structure has transitioned from a polarized world to a period of US hegemony, and then to a stage of multilateralism. How will the global landscape evolve in the post-epidemic era? In an exclusive interview with China News Service, Yu Ligong, a well-known Chinese scholar in Austria, said that the current international problem does not lie in the difference between social progress and backwardness, nor in the difference in culture, belief, art, customs, etc., but Lack of compatibility with each other, and even use their own advantages and beliefs as weapons and reasons to impose on others.
The picture shows Yu Ligong (data photo).Photo by Wan Shuyan
China News Agency reporter: You were born in Shanghai and moved to Taiwan with your parents when you were two years old. He studied and researched at five universities in Europe and the United States, and then settled in Austria, where he devoted himself to studying international politics for many years. Do you think there are conflicts between different civilizations? Or are vested interest groups creating conflicts under the banner of civilization?
Yu Ligong:It depends on how to define civilization and culture. Civilization generally refers to the ability of a society to deal with the problems of nature and society. Culture is all the manifestations of each society in different civilizations and stages of development.
The current problem does not lie in the difference between progress and backwardness in society, nor does it lie in the degree of difference that produces different cultures, such as beliefs, art, customs, etc.; it is the lack of compatibility between each other, and even the lack of compatibility with one’s own advantages. Faith is used as a weapon and reason to impose on others.
Taking religion as an example, it was originally the relationship between “man and god”. Once the personal belief is transformed into the relationship between “man and man” imposed on others, tension will immediately arise. If violence is still used, it will evolve into politicized and militarized religious radicalism. This is also reflected in the current “democratic export”. It seems that only one’s own democracy is a god, and the others are all barbaric and backward. This can be said to be a kind of universal value “religious radicalism”.
As for Samuel Huntington, he believes that only civilizations baptized by Christianity can contribute to human society, while other civilizations can at best be modernized. His blind spot is that Christianity in Europe originated from the Mesopotamia of the Middle East. Why can Europe be grafted with Middle Eastern culture, but the local Middle East cannot contribute? So the question is not whether the culture is commensurable, but that his arrogance leads to the absence of commensurability. This narrowness is also the universal value of “religious radicalism.”
In fact, Huntington originally only suggested that the Western world should carry out cultural containment of other civilization circles. But at that time, neoconservatism had transformed his critical weapon into weapon criticism, forming a militarized religious radicalism movement in the post-Cold War era.
China News Service: Since the end of the US-Soviet Cold War, what are the characteristics of international conflicts? What’s the reason?
Yu Ligong:The West has been expanding for five hundred years, and has established a framework of white rule through colonial aggression and the technological advantages of the industrial revolution. The Industrial Revolution is a brand-new civilization, and all civilization circles that can’t get on the train are completely defeated, and even one by one, it has been reduced from a major civilized country to a sub-cultural status. The Cold War period was a period of slower expansion in the West. In this regard, the containment of the leftist camp is indispensable.
The First World War actually broke out to carve up the Ottoman Empire that was on the verge of collapse. At that time, the so-called “White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Group” (WASP) had already gained an advantage in the international game.
Since then, their strategy has continued to this day: First, to support the weak and backward religious radicalism groups in the Third World (tribes, emirates, and Taliban organizations that pursue the unity of politics and religion) and warlords, with the purpose of obstructing the progress of the Third World while retaining themselves The privileges and resources possessed in the new and old colonialist era; the second is to crack down on all countries and organizations with nationalism, secularization, socialism, and the pursuit of modernization and independence; the third is to consolidate the “Five Eyes Alliance” as the core The framework of white rule, which means controlling global resources and arranging all international orders that are beneficial to oneself.
Take Huntington’s “Clash of Civilization Theory” as an example in the 1990s. The hegemonic group transformed the collective defense organization of the Cold War, the NATO organization, into a violating organization charter (the NATO charter stipulates that actions are limited to the territory of the member states). The international chariot of military aggression; encouraging religious radicalism countries and warlords to contribute money and efforts, not only dismembered Yugoslavia, but also established two Islamic countries in Europe, namely Bosnia and Kosovo.
In addition, since the 1980s, the United States has taken the lead in planning to cultivate two forces in Afghanistan: one is the local militia against the Soviet intervention forces; Afghanistan hosted the training of Islamic radical youth from more than 40 countries (including Europe, America and China) as terrorists. The goal is to overthrow all countries that have problems with the Islamic independence movement, including the Soviet Union, China, Yugoslavia, and India, which was pro-Soviet at that time. The entire 1990s was the most rampant period of terrorists.
Data map: French police simulated terrorist attack exercises.
China News Agency reporter: In recent years, terrorist attacks have occurred frequently in Europe, and the world under the epidemic has cast a shadow again. Issues such as religion, immigration, and conflicts of civilization have once again entered the public eye. What is the underlying reason behind this? Do you think that harmony can be achieved between different religions, races, and civilizations?
Yu Ligong:The past strategy of “supporting terrorists” and “controlling barbarians with barbarians” has been expanded into a war on terrorism under the impetus of the radical wing of the Republican Party in the United States. They believe that terrorists have limited energy and directly launching wars under the pretext of fighting terrorism can produce large-scale domino effects.
The targets of the war on terrorism are those countries that are secularized and take the road of independence, especially those countries that are called by the United Nations as “countries whose development is closest to the developed countries.” These countries happen to be the potential forces that may pose the greatest threat to Israel, religious radicalist conservative countries, and warlord-ruled countries.
Starting from the “September 11” incident, the neo-conservatives not only sent troops themselves, but also took advantage of the trend to crack down on some disobedient terrorist organizations.
In addition to launching the war on terrorism, there is another important change: the economic goal has been to support the “neo-liberalism” promoted in the 1980s, that is, to turn the world into “a one-stop operation from procurement, to production, and sales.” , And remove all obstacles in the entire operation process”, changed to “divide the world into two worlds that are integrated or not integrated in the international industrial chain.”
Those countries that are not integrated are marginal countries to them, so they redistribute resources and rearrange their territories and order through the means of “breaking their national structure.” This idea runs through the “Greater Middle East Policy” of the United States until 2015, when Russia directly intervened in support of Syria.
China News Agency reporter: You once wrote in the article “Religious Conflicts and American Democracy Promotions”: “The United States is not selling orthodox democracy to the outside world.” In your opinion, what difficulties have “American-style capitalism” encountered in the current era?
Yu Ligong:What the United States promotes abroad is not orthodox democratic politics, but American “capitalist religion”: the slogan is “democracy and freedom” and the marketing method is “capital and artillery.” The ultimate goal is “the whole world takes American beliefs as its beliefs and its interests as its interests.” This kind of religious “congenital structural defects” will inevitably cause collisions in the international arena.
The main connotation of neo-liberalism is to promote the one-stop operation of economy and trade and accelerate the circulation and operation of capital. Therefore, promoting the freedom and opening of the financial sector has become a main axis. This has caused the world to face the problem of polarization between the rich and the poor, and the United States is no exception.
It should be noted that many people see the vacuum in the US manufacturing industry and stagnant infrastructure, and they assert that “the United States has fallen.” The industrial vacuum is actually a deliberate arrangement of one-stop operation, that is, the OEM is lost to areas with high-quality and cheap labor, while the capital and most of the profits are still owned by the United States. In addition, through financial crises, American industrial capital took advantage of the trend to copy the equity and stocks of many countries, thus constituting more than 30 trillion U.S. dollars of foreign assets.
In other words, many countries’ manufacturing industries are working for the United States. Although the profit goes to a small group of people, it shows that the polarization problem is serious, but the ruling class is not poor or weak. When there is an urgent need, this small group will not stand by.
Data map: People at the beach in Richmond, California, USA.Photo by China News Agency reporter Liu Guanguan
China News Service: After the US President Biden took office, he repaired his relationship with traditional allies while hoping to win new allies to “join in” in order to contain China’s development. What is the nature of the game between China and the United States in the 21st century? According to your observation, what exactly do the United States and the West want to achieve?
Yu Ligong:The Republican Party prefers to engage in the war on terrorism; the Democratic Party tries to avoid its own casualties and promotes a policy of supporting terrorists of “using the barbarian against the barbarian”. In terms of diplomacy, the Republican Party tends to “unilateralism”, as far as possible to get rid of the shackles of all international organizations, international law and treaties, and it is even better to replace the United Nations and the global will with the will of the United States. In terms of diplomacy, the arbitrary and domineering of former US President Trump is no less than that of the Bush administration, and therefore offended many allies. Today, Biden’s Democratic government is the first to promote “multilateralism.” After more than 100 days of hard work, he has achieved great results in winning cooperation between the EU and ASEAN.
Trump misinterpreted the anti-China policy of the US Congress and the shadow government as a “trade conflict.” The Biden administration will go beyond the scope of trade and carry out an all-round, carpet-like attack (non-military) against China. In addition, the United States has long realized that there is a huge gap in the one-stop operation plan, that is, China’s rapid progress has made the United States feel the hegemony shaken. In view of this, the “one-stop free industrial chain” has given way to the thinking and proposition that “the international industrial chain is divided into three parts: high-end, mid-end and low-end.”
The current hegemonic group is not trying to get rid of dependence on China’s low-end industries, but to prevent China from entering the high-end. What they are eager to promote is that China will always remain content with “international foundry.” China’s high-quality labor and population base cannot be replaced by any other country. Therefore, low- and medium-end products will continue to be exported abroad, and even grow substantially. However, in the eyes of hegemonic groups, this kind of Chinese human resources is like the oil at the foot of the Islamic world. It must be fully utilized, but it will never be easily allowed to reverse the relationship.
China News Agency reporter: What do you think of the Taiwan issue and cross-strait relations? What’s your message to the younger generation on both sides of the strait?
Yu Ligong:When the United States opened the door to Japan with a gunboat in 1853, it used its brain to “occupy Taiwan and contain China.” After the outbreak of the Civil War, the concept changed to “encourage Japan to invade and occupy Taiwan in order to achieve Sino-Japanese diplomatic relations and contain China.” When the Nationalist government retreated to Taiwan, the United States did not forget to lure Chen Cheng and Sun Liren into a coup d’etat so that Taiwan would be independent from China forever. This is a 170-year-long struggle. It does not involve any kind of regime or doctrine in China, but an old question.
The rise of “Taiwan independence” forces in recent years is just a reflection of the inevitable form of their existence: the United States supports “Taiwan independence” forces to create tension between the two sides of the strait.
In the past two years, the United States has determined to contain China and will naturally not forget to push the “Taiwan independence” forces to the forefront. “Taiwan independence” elements rarely have international strategic vision. On the contrary, they think it is the sum of their own strength and international anti-China forces. “Taiwan independence” forces are just a prop on the international stage.
The so-called Taiwan issue is actually a Sino-US issue. Once the time is right, it will be resolved quietly like Hong Kong. The current situation is very tense. The past few years have determined whether China can overcome the last hurdle set by hegemony. This requires the wisdom and efforts of the Chinese people.
Data map: Taiwanese youth walked into Jilin to view science and technology to see development.Photo by Gao Longan
Reporter from China News Service: As a Chinese, you have lived abroad for a long time, especially in Europe. Do you think there are any passives, obstacles or problems with Chinese or Asians in the cultural exchanges between China and the West? Does Europe discriminate against the Chinese?
Yu Ligong:Overseas Chinese rely on the hard-working, thrifty and entrepreneurial spirit of the Chinese people overseas. However, what social status they can achieve is largely affected by Sino-foreign relations and China’s international status. The relationship between them and their ancestral (home) country is not broken, but closely related and dependent on each other. This is why “going abroad is more patriotic”.
Since the Industrial Revolution, a pattern of white rule has been formed in the world. Europe has spared no effort in shaping “Eurocentrism” in recent hundreds of years. Since Europeans want to weave a mythical story of a “superior nation” for themselves, the other side of the same coin must be the “slightly inferior” people of color.
The lower the society, the more obvious the xenophobia and fear of foreigners, which of course has something to do with cultural education. Unfortunately, humanistic accomplishment and humanistic care are not given due attention in most societies. (Finish)
Yu Ligong, male, born in Shanghai in 1947, a well-known Austrian Chinese scholar, professor of international politics, moved to Taiwan with his parents in 1949, went to Europe and the United States in 1964 to study in the University of Vienna, San Francisco State University, West Berlin University, Heidelberg University, Frankfurt University studies and research, majoring in political science and sociology, currently living in Vienna, Austria, author of “Post-Cold War International Dialogue” (Taipei Laurel Bookstore, 1994), “Anti-Terrorism War and Civilization Clash” (Taipei Xiuwei Bookstore, 2008) year).
【Editor in charge: Liang Yi】
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