My new book 'A Brief History of
#Vietnam
' is out! Published by
@TuttleBooks
it's a succinct narrative from prehistory to the present, integrating diverse perspectives and recent scholarship. It might ruffle some feathers...
Genuine question... When China built a hospital in a week in Wuhan, social media were full of "Wow, amazing" news stories and comments. When the UK built a hospital in a week in London social media are "Meh...". Why the difference?
🎉Finally found a South China Sea document I’ve been seeking for a long time! An 1899 translation of a letter in which the ‘Chinese Foreign Ministry’ (the Zongli Yamen of the Qing Great State) says the Paracel Islands are ‘high seas’ and, implicitly, not part of its territory...
China establishes two districts to manage the South China Sea - a little thread to explain why this decision exposes the nonsense of China's territorial claims
I don't think it's because outsiders are surprised that China can do such a thing. I think it's the opposite. It's a frame of thinking that sees the West as exhausted and China as the source of innovation and progress. Which is odd...
More nonsense history of the South China Sea published by the South China Morning Post - this time written by the CEO of a private equity firm. I guess this is what corporate bosses have to do to gain favour from Beijing these days. Anyway, rebuttal...
Freshly-minted PhD! With grateful thanks to my lovely wife who convinced me that my South China Sea jottings could be turned into a doctorate and (just as importantly) made sure I did so...
The Ukrainian crisis must never be repeated in Asia, and regional security should be promoted through dialogue and cooperation. Attempts by certain forces outside the region to undermine peace in the South China Sea will not succeed. China is always willing to resolve differences
Other generations may have stormed beaches and reached for the sky but for us, here, now, the defence of liberal democracy and the free and open rules-based international order demands the drinking of a lot of Australian wine.
China disapproves of the use of sanctions to solve problems, still less unilateral sanctions that have no basis in international law. It has long been proved that sanctions, far from being a solution, will only create new problems.
China is going to an extraordinary amount of effort to defend what is, in essence, a fictitious territorial claim in the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. Shows the power of bullshit narratives to motivate state action.
Just been to the new
@britishmuseum
exhibition on ‘China’s Hidden Century’. It’s brilliant - and brilliantly subversive, subtly undermining so many Chinese nationalist narratives…
Data crunched by
@TheEconomist
shows that China’s “maritime road” is more about defending international choke points than sourcing raw materials or seeking new markets via
@TheEconomist
1/10 I’m very pleased to unveil the cover of my new book ‘The Invention of China’ due for publication in September 2020 by
@YaleBooks
. I thought I would explain why I think the cover - designed by
@Mister_Kirby
- is so great.
China is blocking Vietnam and the Philippines from developing their own offshore gas resources in the South China Sea with threats of force. Instead, the two countries are importing LNG - with implications for national budgets, jobs and energy security.
@StanfordsTravel
So, ridiculous as it sounds, Indonesia’s current problems with China in the South China Sea are the results of poor translation and bad map-making in China in the 1930s. Beijing’s claim is based on ignorance.
Looking at some old Chinese maps in the
@SOAS
library. This from 1934. No Spratly Islands of course but I’m interested in the way it asserts claims to Tibet and Mongolia (then both independent) but not Taiwan...
So the correct response is either to laugh at China for maintaining this ridiculous territorial claim or be concerned that China is attempting to rewrite international law and claim bits of underwater seabed hundreds of miles from its shores. The End (of this thread, at least).
Things you don’t expect to find in the English countryside - Sun Yat-sen’s holiday home! This house in the mid-Bedfordshire village of Cottered was often visited by Sun Yat-sen, ‘the first president of China’ because it was owned by his former medical tutor, Sir James Cantlie…
If Mr Putin’s aim was to construct a sense of deep nationhood in Ukraine, unite Europeans, trigger a new resolve in Western policy-making and make everyone come off the fence about his regime - then his war has been a massive success so far.
If this really is political retaliation, it's evidence of the stupidity of Chinese foreign policy. To undermine the most pro-Chinese leadership that Vietnam has had since 2001 looks like self-inflicted injury. And it all goes back to China's bogus claims in the South China Sea...
Hundreds of containers of bananas, dragonfruits & durians, on their way to China, have suddenly been stopped since 9 Sept. Vietnam’s Plant Protection Authority said it was for quality check but the timing raised some eyebrows. CN is VN’s biggest market for agriculture products.
Chinese scientists worry about the long-term viability of the South China Sea artificial islands. Academic study from the PRC National Defense University (in Chinese)👇
Update on the slow coup/security takeover of the Communist Party of Vietnam. Report that General Lương Cường (formerly Director of the Army’s General Department of Politics) has replaced Truong Thi Mai as the head of the Communist Party Secretariat - a key position.
I tell the full story in my article for Modern China here
I will also flesh out some of the characters involved, in my next book for
@yalepress
‘The Invention of China’ due to be published in September.
END OF THREAD!
On this day (21 July), 25 years ago, ASEAN foreign ministers first called for a Code of Conduct for the South China Sea. A quarter-century later, China is still blocking progress. Happy anniversary CoC discussions! Here’s to the next quarter-century!
So the Zhongsha was completely invented. Nonetheless China is locked into the idiotic position of claiming a group of islands that don't actually exist. This tells us much of what we need to know about the haphazard way that its claim in the South China Sea was developed.
Among its other functions, the Chinese consulate in Houston spied on - and occasionally threatened - the oil industry. Several incidents involving international energy companies, engineering consultants and sub-contractors working for Vietnam can be traced to its operatives.
"Seriously?"
Soldiers from People Liberation Army shouting and throwing rocks at Vietnamese excavators along the Sino-Vietnam border.
Civilian workers have been strengthing the river banks on the Vietnam's side to prevent landslides as the current picks up.
Why won't Southeast Asian states celebrate their maritime history?
Malaysia - it's pre-Islamic
Indonesia - it's pre-Islamic
Philippines - it's pre-Christian
Vietnam - it's pre-Viet/Kinh
Everywhere - it means celebrating the marginalised Badjao/Orang Laut/Sea Gypsy communities
Celebrate May Fourth with the freshly-published paperback edition of ‘The Invention of China’ - an exploration of the hybrid origins of Chinese nationalism…
China paid Malta £21 million to cover the cost of buying and 'refurbishing' its Brussels embassy (left) directly opposite the European Commission (right). I'm sure it was simple generosity. Nothing to see here...
Latest Huawei spy activities: "According to Le Monde, British agents warned their Belgian counterparts that the Chinese were using Malta’s embassy as a 'spy tower' to eavesdrop the Commission building, which is in close proximity."
Explaining what I mean by ‘The Invention of China’ for
@Diplomat_APAC
. Thanks to
@sstrangio
for the searching questions. If you like this, there a lot more in the book...!
So that's the real top triumvirate in Vietnam:
• Communist Party General-Secretary (Trong),
• Minister of Public Security (To Lam)
• Head of the Communist Party Central Organisation Commission (Mai)
The Leninist true believers and the securocrats are in charge
After six years when President Duterte didn't host a single senior Vietnamese leader, the Philippines is making a big effort to renew ties with Vietnam and work together on the South China Sea... by
@Richeydarian
via
@asiatimesonline
This is because Bai Meichu didn't understand the western maps he was copying and drew areas of shallow sea as islands. Here's one example - a map published by Stanfords in 1918 entitled 'Asiatic Archipelago'. You can see the Macclesfield Bank as an area of shallow sea...
This is clearly a commercial oil survey that a Chinese government agency is undertaking in the Exclusive Economic Zone of another country. That's a clear violation of UNCLOS. Time for Malaysia to take China to an International Tribunal perhaps...
The fifth day of Haiyang Dizhi 8's survey through roughly 4000 square km in Malaysia's EEZ, with its current position is about 175 nm from Malaysia's baseline. The average length of each survey line is 125 nm. How large the survey will expand?
Where does China's paranoia about maps come from? In chap7 of
#TheInventionOfChina
I look at the ways this territorial anxiety was deliberately cultivated by the Nationalists in the 1930s with academic geography and racial science leading the way. To be published in October...
Lots of rumours that
#Vietnam
’s President Nguyen Xuan Phuc is politically phucd. If true, unprecedented in recent decades. General-Secretary Trong breaking all precedents to clear out those his gang regards as insufficiently hard-line
The problem is that since China is now locked into this idiotic position it might try to 'reverse engineer' international law and say that it is entitled to claim underwater features as territory. It would rather try to overthrow centuries of agreement than admit its mistake.
This is my favourite description of the Belt and Road Initiative so far:
"a highly centralized and coordinated marketing campaign attached to the less-coordinated activities of China’s state-owned enterprises and asset managers"
Finally, the foreign policy parts only refers to community of shared destiny and there is no mention of Belt and Road in the whole communique. This is consistent with the regular weakening of Belt and Road chat over the past year
The bizarre story of China's U-shaped line - it's really just a series of mistakes. The story finally published in 'Modern China' - by me. The Modern Origins of China’s South China Sea Claims: Maps, Misunderstandings, and the Maritime Geobody
Obviously a lot going on in this tweet but it's weird that a Chinese nationalist should claim credit for the saving of 30,000 Jewish lives when in Shanghai when they actually fled to the colonial International Settlement of Shanghai because of its laissez-faire no-visa policy
“In a surprise move, the Trump administration has issued a statement on the South China Sea that is consistent with international law, grounded in historical evidence, and completely in line with the expectations of the United States’ allies and partners.” My thoughts...
The Trump administration’s recent move in the South China Sea gave South Asian nations hope for protection from China. But the U.S is unlikely to shed any blood for the cause, leaving regional governments’ alone in the fight,
@bill_hayton
writes.
Really pleased to discover that the (traditional) Chinese edition of 'The Invention of China' (製造中國: 近代中國如何煉成的九個關鍵詞) has just been released in Taiwan by Rye Field Publishing (麥田出版股份有限公司)
The best thing I’ve read on 5G and Huawei so far - by someone who actually understands the tech - “there is no physical or logical separation between the core and edge of the network” via
@aspi_org
This is a grim story. Indonesian workers employed on Chinese fishing boats - 3 died at sea, bodies thrown overboard - "not allowed to drink bottled mineral water on the ship (reserved for Chinese crew) and were told to drink only filtered seawater"
If you know about the history of the sovereignty disputes over the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea you may know of the 1890s dispute over the looting of shipwrecks in which Chinese officials allegedly denied any responsibility for the islands. Excited to see the documents!
"until recently, the US had not disputed or objected to China’s claims"
The US is neutral on the TERRITORIAL claims of all sides. It (& many other states) is not neutral on the unlawful MARITIME claims of the various sides. If you don't understand this, don't write the article
In this piece, Dr.
@bill_hayton
presents historical evidences that debunks the claim that the allies promised the islands in the South China Sea to China.
Now let's look at a real map of the South China Sea... The Zhongsha islands are, in fact, an area of shallow sea called, in English, the 'Macclesfield Bank'.
I've never seen this before. A photo of Sun Yat-sen's inauguration as 'Provisional President' of the Republic of China in Guangzhou, 29 December 1911. This photo archive is superb...
Le Thanh Hai arrested for money laundering and transferring money abroad, causing a loss of 50 billion USD to the Vietnamese government; Collaborated with Chinese spies to sabotage the Vietnamese economy for 15 years in Ho Chi Minh City.
The U.K. didn’t complain when Chinese warships sailed through U.K. territorial waters last year. China doesn’t have a valid argument here. This is what international law looks like.
If you want my uneducated opinion, Australia’s acquisition of long range cruise missiles now is more important than its decision to build submarines that may go to sea in 15 years’ time...
After a busy period working with partners and allies in the East China Sea, we are now en route through the Taiwan Strait to visit
#Vietnam
and the Vietnam People's Navy.
#CSG21
International by design
"Chinese distant-water fleet... widespread, and harmful, economic, environmental and human consequences linked to overcapacity, high instances of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, destructive practises such as bottom trawling and the use of forced [ASEAN] labour"
We urgently need greater
#transparency
in the fishing sector.
“This is the only way we can be sure that we, as consumers, don’t end up eating slave-caught fish and driving the destruction of our ocean”, says
@steventrent
.
Our new investigation of China's distant water fleet 📽️
.
@StateDept
’s latest study on the PRC's maritime claims in the South China Sea concludes that the claims are inconsistent with international law. We call on the PRC to conform its claims to international law as reflected in the Law of the Sea Convention.
Revised manuscript off to the publisher! Many thanks to the anonymous reviewers. ‘The invention of China’ should be out with
@yalepress
in mid-2020...
Really pleased and proud to have been appointed the new editor of the
@RSAsianAffairs
journal ‘Asian Affairs’! Looking forward to reading all your submissions…
More on that 1899 letter in which Qing China denied responsibility for the Paracel Islands - including very rare video of the researcher (me) at work... Good contextualising comments from
@SteinTonnesson
and
@IanJStorey
too... via
@RadioFreeAsia
A good moment to remember that 5 Paracel Islands - Pattle, Roberts, Drummond, Duncan & Money - are named after managers of the East India Company who organised the first survey of them in 1810. Chinese name for Money Island - Jinyin Dao is simply a translation of the English name
@HMSEnterprise
’s presence in Vietnam will be an opportunity to exploit the MoU on hydrographic cooperation between 🇬🇧 and 🇻🇳 as well as to strengthen the links between the two countries’ Navies.
#UKVN2020
@DefenceHQ
@VNGovtPortal
China to Germany: THE PERFORMANCE OF GERMANY HAS FAILED THE SECURITY COUNCIL - China’s stinging assessment of Germany’s two-year non-permanent membership of the SC and send-off of Germany's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Christoph Heusgen: no love lost
Great to be in
#Toronto
for the first time and finally meet the statue of Sun Yat-sen that graces the cover of my book ‘The Invention of China’. The statue has a fittingly hybrid origin story…
Looks like China Coast Guard 5304 approached and harrassed Vietnam's Hai Thach platform (PQP-HT) in Block 5-02 in the South China Sea this morning. Commercial gas production from the Moc Tinh and Hai Thach fields offshore Vietnam began in 2013.
Indonesia’s EEZ is claimed in line with the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Indonesia has the rights to the resources up to 200 nautical miles from inhabited territory. But where does China’s ‘U-shaped line’ come from? (Map:
@madeandi
)
It's named after a British ship, the Macclesfield, which informed the European world of its existence in 1701. The French named it the 'Banc des Anglais' and - I'm told - that the original Chinese name was translation of that - literally 'Sands of the barbarians with the red hair
It was only when China decided to claim the Spratlys after the Second World War that the Macclesfield Bank was renamed 'Zhongsha' - 'central sands' and the name 'Nansha' was moved several hundred miles south to become the name for the Spratlys.
The Philippines is trying to repair its runway on Thitu/Pagasa and expanding the island by 8 acres. In response China is massing as many as 95 vessels to try and obstruct the work. Great use of satellite imagery by
@asiamti
In 1899, Sun Yat-sen commissioned a map of a country called 'Zhina' which divided 'Zhina proper' from its 'dependencies'. I'll be talking about the construction/invention of Chinese ideas of national territory for
@RAS_Soc
on Thursday...
Let us explore the real history of the
#SouthChinaSea
. Prof. Zheng Zhihua
@Zhengyimingdao
will publish three articles in succession to discuss the
misconceptions in the researches of Dr. Hayton
@bill_hayton
et al. Here is the first piece.
Exciting!! The proof for my ‘Brief History of Vietnam’ has arrived! Out this year from
@TuttleBooks
A post-colonial, post-nationalist, ‘borderless’ history for new times…
At this point - because the Chinese government didn't claim the Spratly Islands at this time. The Macclesfield Bank was named the 'Nansha' - or 'Southern Sands' on Chinese maps