TOM PLATE WRITES — Without becoming too defensive about America at this rocky passage in its political history (well, it is difficult to defend), I nonetheless will offer something of a defense, since almost no one else wants to try, but maybe someone ought to. So we start with this: Whether…
Category: Tom Plate
CHINA-US RELATIONS: NO FORCE CAN CONTAIN CHINA EXCEPT BEIJING
TOM PLATE WRITES — American foreign policy rarely rises to the level of coherence recommended by its policy intellectuals and thoughtful diplomats; but without their persistence, it would be bereft of any coherence at all. When World War Two ended, for example, the American establishment came to rally around the containment…
Paranoia Paramount: IS IT PLAUSIBLE TO COMPARE TRUMP TO MAO?
TOM PLATE WRITES — The stars and stripes of the American flag, as if sliced by partisanship into bipolar bands of red and blue, never seemed more at cross-purpose. Only true haters might find pleasure in the proceedings. In the House, as if plowing through a field of empty dreams and…
CHINA-US RELATIONS: LET THINK TANKS THINK, NOT TANK
TOM PLATE WRITES — Right, you don’t have to remind me: the Chinese civilization of three thousand-plus years has at its ready ancient sayings for almost everything that comes up in life – sort of like the French who “always have a word for it”. Well, we Americans are not voiceless…
Hong Kong: QUICK COMMENTARY ON THE BEST WAY FOR U.S. TO HELP CHINA – IN ‘USA TODAY’
ASIA MEDIA WRITES – The following succinct commentary was solicited by the editors of USA Today and provided by our founder and president, Prof Tom Plate. It was published in this well-known national newspaper on Thursday 15-16 August. Please see: https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2019/08/15/donald-trump-right-china-over-hong-kong-editorials-debates/2024883001/ TEXT By Tom Plate The notion that the U.S. should…
Hong Kong: LET’S GET SOME SIMPLE FACTS STRAIGHT!
[Pix above of US Secretary of Sate Mike Pompeo] TOM PLATE WRITES – Let’s get some simple facts straight: Hong Kong is not in the sovereign hands of the People’s Republic of China due to crass invasion or communist subversion or anything nefarious. This historic territory was semi-willingly deeded back…
AUSTRALIA AND CHINA: DESTINED TO FIGHT OVER THE ‘LITTLE CHILDREN’ OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC?
TOM PLATE WRITES — Australia has a China problem, and it’s not clear that anyone can help it out of the box it’s in. Yes, it’s a China box: The ground underneath the Asia-Pacific is starting to shake, and the incipient foreign-policy shakeout ‘Down Under’ may well tell those of…
THE suzerainty ESCAPE: how beijing can make Hong Kong happy again
TOM PLATE WRITES – One of the most significant political events in years and potentially one of the most historic will be known as the Battle for Hong Kong. And it is anything but played out. Beijing achingly wanted Hong Kong and decades ago got what it wanted. But is…
HONG KONG: WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN BIG GOVERNMENT MAKES A BIG MISTAKE?
TOM PLATE WRITES — How should citizens react when Big Government does a bad thing that screams out for correction? One approach is to slip into denial and imagine nothing at all happened, because leaders are apt to err, so the best thing for your mental health is to look…
CHINA: THE PAINFUL PARADOX OF TIANANMEN RETROSPECTIVES
TOM PLATE WRITES – This is about the downside of overwrought moralizing. For inconvenient truths must be carefully considered on this week marking the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square uprising and suppression. Much is at risk in the clarity and ethical framework with which the U.S. views China – and…
THE VATICAN: POPE FRANCIS’ SECRETARY OF STATE PIETRO PAROLIN SHOWS A DIPLOMATIC TOUCH WITH CHINA
TOM PLATE WRITES – ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’: Trust takes a long time to build up. Worse yet, in clumsy hands it can vanish before you know it. Notice how the trust-factor between Beijing and Washington seems to be bottoming out almost faster than you can say ‘the Spirit of Mar-a-Lago…
LOS ANGELES: WHO REALLY UNDERSTANDS CHINA?
TOM PLATE WRITES – Who has a good sense of China? From America, I will read anything by the sagacious Orville Schell, now with the Asia Society in New York, nested at the Center for U.S. China Relations; or by globe-trotting Nathan Gardels, whose superb fourth chapter in his just…
HONG KONG: SO WHEN WILL CHINA’S ‘WORLD DOMINATION TOUR’ COMMENCE?
TOM PLATE WRITES – In coming months look for broad gripes and bright anti-red stars over the land of the free, not to mention the home of the brave. The “Committee on the Present Danger: China” – cliché bombs bursting in the media air – begins its anti-communist show in the…
HONG KONG: THE VERY THOUGHT OF TRUMP’S IMPEACHMENT STARTS TO SHAKE UP THE WORLD
TOM PLATE WRITES – When President Donald J. Trump abruptly folded his diplomatic tent in Hanoi and flew back to Washington without a de-nuclearization/sanctions-relief deal with North Korea, the temperature in the Vietnamese capital had been pleasantly upper-70s (F). But on landing, the American capital seemed much, much colder in…
VIETNAM: ‘THE FINE ART OF THE POLITICAL INTERVIEW’ PUBLISHED BY HOUSE OF TRE
ASIA MEDIA INTERNATIONAL WRITES – Tre Publishing House, the noted publisher of books and magazines and one of the top publishers in Vietnam, has issued its Vietnamese translation of ‘The Fine Art of the Political Interview’. Serving a dynamic country of almost 97 million, Tre (https://www.nxbtre.com.vn/en/about-us/general-introduction.htm) has its headquarters in…
HONG KONG: UNEASY LIES THE HEAD THAT WEARS THE CROWN OF THE SUPERPOWER
PROF TOM PLATE WRITES – It’s not easy being a superpower, and whoever would imagine such might be the case? Sometimes one almost feels an odd twang of sympathy for the leaders of China and the U.S. Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown of the superpower. Could any…