Letters | China’s military posturing during its National Day parade won’t win it any friends

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Troops take part in a military parade on China’s National Day on October 1. The parade featured some of the People’s Liberation Army’s most sophisticated arsenal – a show of power that would not go down well with the many already rankled by Beijing’s growing assertiveness on the global stage. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 6:20am, 7 Oct 2019Updated: 6:20am, 7 Oct 2019

Looking at all the military hardware on display for the October 1 celebration of the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China, and reflecting on the Chinese occupation of the South China Sea and its Belt and Road Initiative, one can’t get away from the incongruity of it all, with respect to the challenges facing China today.

Whom or what is China up against militarily and to what end? Are its neighbours such a huge threat? “Belt and road” to where? To extend China’s influence?

Billions of renminbi have been spent on militarising the South China Sea, and many millions more are being spent on its maintenance. Meanwhile, hypersonic weaponry is being developed. What for? If the US is the target, is China going to destroy what is arguably its biggest customer?

Meanwhile, the trade war goes on. The belt and road drifts aimlessly and has come in for criticism as “China’s big giveaway”. China rages against any foreign power, corporation, or individual by whom it feels slighted today, yesterday, last year or in my grandpa’s time.

Sure, China can flatten Hong Kong in a day – it could have done so in 1967 too – and China can probably destroy Taiwan from a distance. Meanwhile, Tibet and Xinjiang are being remade in the President Xi Jinping’s preconceived mould of Chineseness.

Why does China hew to such harsh and angry narratives to promote itself and its ideology? Here’s an idea: I have been in the insurance business in Hong Kong for going on 50 years, and I can’t ever remember selling a policy by whacking my potential client over the head to convince them to buy.