AMI FOUNDER TOM PLATE WRITES – Over the decades, even during rare warmish breaks in the tundra of US-China relations, I do not think I ran across a single American foreign correspondent who claimed that their Beijing posting was an easy job. The other day, while thoroughly enjoying former CNN…
Full Article ASSIGNMENT CHINA: MIKE CHOY’S ENGROSSING ORAL HISTORY
This column originally appeared on February 8, 2023, in the South China Morning Post. DISTINGUISHED SCHOLAR TOM PLATE WRITES – Hot air propels not just balloons. Embattled President Joseph Biden and his battle-prone Washington – the American capital more divided, presumably, than that of Chairman Xi Jinping’s Beijing – clashed…
Full Article CHINA-US POLICY: IS THE ‘MOON A BALLOON’?
This column originally appeared on Dec. 7, 2022, in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – Did you know that, in American-speak, a group of flying Corvids is not called a “flock” but a “murder.” You could look it up! Right now, amid the warm Laguna…
Full Article US-CHINA RELATIONS: BOSS XI’S ‘OVERREACH’ CUTTING BEIJING DOWN TO SIZE?
This column originally appeared on October 5, 2022, in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – To lose one’s sense of decency by raising the threat of nuclear weapons just once – here we’re talking directly to you, Mr. Vladimir Putin – may be dismissed as…
Full Article OPINION: HOW THE US, NOT JUST RUSSIA, HELPED BRING THE WORLD CLOSER TO NUCLEAR WAR
This column originally appeared in on August 23, 2022 in the South China Morning Post. CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – A media system can filter your world-view not unlike the narrowest religion claiming to know what’s best about everything. Truly professional media platforms, especially if print-based, will aim to…
Full Article US-KOREAN RELATIONS: US MEDIA MUST LAY GROUNDWORK FOR PEACE OFFENSIVE ON KOREAN PENINSULA
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – Can our world evolve into a collective mindset incapable of losing it even under extreme pressure? Anyone who tracked with growing alarm the American queen’s forced march through East Asia last week might well have asked themselves – but at what cost? The entourage…
Full Article US-CHINA RELATIONS: NANCY PELOSI’S TAIWAN TRIP HIGHLIGHTS NEED TO RESET GLOBAL THINKING
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – Today’s US-China relations are more akin to a rugby match than an elegant balletic pas de deux. Nothing illustrates this better than the Nancy Pelosi Taiwan caper. Sure, when it comes to the moralism of the average American politician, sensitivity to other political cultures…
Full Article US-CHINA RELATIONS: IF PELOSI REALLY WANTS PEACE TO PREVAIL IN TAIWAN, SHE’LL STAY AWAY
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – You might well be starting to believe that the calibre of today’s political leadership isn’t what it used to be. Suddenly, the global field of play is cluttered with stunning individual wreckage. Political uncertainty rules, a war sparked by an invasion reveals our current…
Full Article WORLD: ASIA NEEDS LEADERS OF THE CALIBRE OF SINGAPORE’S LEE KUAN YEW TO NAVIGATE A MESSY WORLD
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – An unexpected invitation came via email last week that will prove either of no more import than any of the other stuff in my inbox, or instead a tea leaf to be read and analysed with care and an open mind. It was an…
Full Article CHINA-US RELATIONS: A THAW IN CHINA-US DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS? WE CAN ONLY HOPE
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – Major participants in the Russia-Ukraine war, whether involved directly or by proxy, lack agreement about when and how it must end. These varying perspectives result in an unseemly policy scrum, adding more confusion to this humanitarian tragedy. This obscene war, despite the many ways…
Full Article RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR: NO ONE, CHINA INCLUDED, WANTS TO SEE THE UKRAINE WAR GOING NUCLEAR
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – It’s just possible that a favorable diplomatic wind is forming that could alter the trajectory of the storm of war raging over Ukraine, the second-largest country in Europe. Pushing this war out to sea might help clear the gathering clouds of world economic collapse.…
Full Article U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS: WHY U.S. ARROGANCE, NOT THE RUSSIA-CHINA RELATIONSHIP, IS THE BIGGEST BARRIER TO PEACE IN UKRAINE
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – The topic of nuclear war is no joking matter, but I was rather tempted to cry out “Get me rewrite!” while dipping into my old book on the nuclear arms race. So much is changing now. My published tome had been premised on the…
Full Article THREAT OF RUSSIAN NUCLEAR ATTACK SHOWS WHY CHINA’S NO-FIRST-USE POLICY SHOULD BE GLOBAL STANDARD
CLINICAL PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES – I submit for your consideration an American political figure named Jerry Brown. He turns 84 this week but is somehow still flamboyant and relevant, if sometimes slightly annoying. I have not only grown to admire him but come to feel this lifelong politician is…
Full Article US-CHINA RELATIONS: NEED ‘PLANETARY REALISM’ TO AVOID GEOPOLITICAL AND ECOLOGICAL APOCALYPSE
TOM PLATE WRITES – It is imperative that the government of Xi Jinping of China continue to edge away from the bleak dark shadow of Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine and re-settle itself geopolitically into a better moral place. While it would be presumptuous to offer instructions on how in…
Full Article UKRAINE: CRISIS CALLS FOR CHINA TO TAKE PART IN A DARING DIPLOMATIC INTERVENTION
PROFESSOR TOM PLATE WRITES — Suppose I stopped working so hard to stay on the sunny optimistic side of the street but instead defected to the dark side and always anticipating the worst? Consider the figure of Vladimir Putin. Just try to stay optimistic after reading the depressing but richly…
Full Article THE PUTIN SHADOW: DARKENING VISIONS OF OPTIMISM
TOM PLATE WRITES — The Chinese tilt towards Russia is understandable enough. It is immensely satisfying to be able to tell American leaders that China will do what it wants to do, whether the arrogant West likes it or not. China is the big deal now – or so goes…
Full Article UKRAINE CRISIS: IS CHINA’S TILT TOWARDS RUSSIA IN BEIJING’S BEST LONG-TERM INTEREST?