The Philip DeFranco Show - MS 2.7 China's Century of Humiliation & Why The South China Sea Is Such a Big Problem

Episode Date: February 7, 2019

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Hello, hello, welcome to your extra morning news show. My name is Philip DeFranco with my co-host today, loudest shirt that I own. And in this video, we're gonna be talking about possibly the sexiest story of the day. We are talking hot Chinese territorial disputes. Right, we're gonna be talking about why one of the biggest countries in the world,

a world power, cares so much about a few tiny islands in the ocean, with China even disagreeing with some neighbors over who owns islands in both the South and East China Sea. So back in January, the US Navy ran what's called a Freedom of Navigation Operation, and they sailed a destroyer 12 nautical miles from one of the disputed islands.

According to a Navy spokeswoman, the operation was meant to challenge excessive Chinese claims in the area, and in response, China complained that the operation, quote, infringes on China's sovereignty. But of note, this isn't really a new thing. These operations have happened before because the island disputes have been unresolved for a long time now. So with that in note, this isn't really a new thing. These operations have happened before because the island disputes have been unresolved

for a long time now. So with that in mind, we wanted to take a look into why China cares so much. And there are a lot of reasons why China cares, but one reason we're going to talk about today is one you probably wouldn't expect, and that is how outraged the country is over its own past and how much of those lasting frustrations

are affecting it right now. So like I said, China disagrees with its neighbors over who owns parts of the South China Sea. And that sea borders a few countries, including the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Brunei, and China. And what we're talking about here is a really important economic hub.

Estimates have varied, but reportedly about 21% of the world's total trade, it passed through the South China Sea in 2016. And in addition to that, there's also a lot of evidence that parts of the South China Sea have a massive And in addition to that, there's also a lot of evidence that parts of the South China Sea have a massive amount of untapped oil and natural gas, about 11 billion barrels of oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

And to kind of give you a frame of reference, for the United States, that would be about two and a half years of oil production and about a fifth of a year of gas production. And so the big thing here is if you look back at the map of the South China Sea, China is clearly not closest to most of the sea. And that is where the disagreement starts.

Now if you look at this map, China actually claims all of the area within the red dashed line. And the blue dashed line show other countries claims to the area as well. So where are these claims coming from? Well, China makes its huge claim primarily based on a map that appeared sometime between 1946 and 1948. And people refer to that claim as the nine dash line because there are nine dashes that mark Chinese claims. Now on the other hand, all the other countries make their claims based on a 1982 United Nations agreement.

It's called the Law of the Sea. And that says that a country is entitled to an exclusive economic zone or EEZ, 200 nautical miles from its coast. And that's meant for things like fishing, resources and energy exploration. And the thing is all the countries we talked about including China Have signed that agreement

But as you might have already heard China is literally building islands in the South China Sea and at the heart of this Disagreement are a couple of island chains They're called the Spratly Islands and the Paracel Islands and as you can see they're all inside China's nine-dash line But many of them overlap with other countries claim and in recent years China has been building islands in the sea This is fiery cross Island about 10 years ago, and here it is at the beginning of 2018. And as you can see, it has Chinese military installations now.

This is Tree Island in 2012, and here it is at the end of 2017, complete with a harbor. And those aren't the only ones. There's another dispute with Japan, and it's over a group of islands in the East China Sea. The Japanese call them the Senkakus, and the Chinese call them the Diaoyu Daos.

I probably mispronounced that. I apologize to you, Mr. President. But what we see are both countries making historical claims to those islands. You have Japan saying that back in 1895, it claimed those islands because there were no previous claims to them. And today, it has a whole museum

that's dedicated to just proving that the islands are Japanese. Meanwhile, the Chinese make claims based on navigational records from about 500 years ago. So by now, in addition to wondering why China is having these disputes, might also be wondering why China is building islands in the area.

Well, China has a lot of unusual territorial situations that are related to why China has these current disputes. And we're not gonna dive deep into all of them, but these are the sources of some of the biggest ones. First up is China's unique relationship with Taiwan and Hong Kong. Taiwan was a Japanese colony. Japan grabbed that island after defeating China in a war back in 1895, but after World War II, Japan lost that island, and then after the Chinese Civil War, the Nationalist

Party fled there where it established its own government. So today, Taiwan is a de facto separate country from China, and actually Hong Kong is similar. It was a British colony after the first Opium War back in 1842, but in 1898, Britain signed a 99-year lease with China for Hong Kong is similar. It was a British colony after the first opium war back in 1842. But in 1898, Britain signed a 99 year lease with China for Hong Kong. And that meant that back in 1997, China got Hong Kong back. And so today, Hong Kong is governed under an idea called one country, two systems, because it had such a different society for so long.

And the island disputes where China gets heated with its neighbors also have their roots in imperialism. When Japan was expanding its empire in the early 20th century, it claimed a few islands in the Paracel and Spratly Island chains in the 1920s. And eventually those islands and a lot more territory were encircled by Japan's World War II empire,

which was lost back in 1945. And we saw something similar happen to the Senkakus in the East China Sea, with Japan claiming those islands right around the time it took hold of Taiwan in 1895. And so basically what this all means is that a lot of China's current territorial issues go back to imperialism when western countries and Japan were grabbing territory in Asia. Or to simplify it for you there are a lot of political cartoons from that era that really

sum it up. Now the other question here is why is China still engaged in these disputes today? It's true that there are resources there, it's true that it's a strategic area, but one reason that experts find really important to understanding China's actions in the region is something called the Century of Humiliation. Basically from 1839 to 1949, China was pushed around. It had its territory stolen. It saw tens of millions of citizens die from war, drugs, and rebellions.

And this is something that the government has reminded its citizens of a lot. Now at this point you might be wondering, well how bad was this Century of Humiliation? Well, here are just a few of the terrible highlights in 1842 and 1860 China lost the two opium wars to Britain because it tried to stop drug smuggling in its own territory in 1860 the British and French Invaded its capital and destroyed an imperial palace in 1895 China lost a war to Japan which used to be kind of a tributary to it In 1900 China was invaded by eight countries at once to squash an internal rebellion that was very anti-foreign

There were also some other internal rebellions and wars sprinkled in there as well in the 1930s Japan took over part of China called Manchuria then and just to warn you the next two events are very graphic in 1937 Japan carried out a devastating bombing campaign on Shanghai and the infamous and it might not be infamous to you But it is infamous rape of Nan, where they murdered and raped tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Chinese in the city of Nanjing. And to top all of this off, after World War II ended, China carried on a civil war until 1949.

And when that civil war ended and the Communist Party won, China's leader, Mao Zedong, announced that the century of humiliation was over. And you may be asking, well, how do we know that this is important to Chinese leaders and influences Chinese policy today? Well, there are a lot of experts that have written about this,

and we're gonna look at a few examples. For example, China's navy was a weakness during the century of humiliation, like during the first Opium War and the first Sino-Japanese War. And so experts think that those naval defeats could help understand China's current naval buildup. Back in 2014, China commemorated the beginning

of the first Sino-Japanese War at a place where they were defeated. And at the ceremony, the chief commander of the navy reportedly spoke about how, quote, "'It takes courage to rethink the past shame "'and history reminds us that a country will not prosper "'without a developed military force.'" And it was reported that he also said

that holding the memorial where China had been defeated was a way to remember the war and encourage China's naval buildup. Another example took place in 2009. China held a ceremony celebrating the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. But 2009 also marked 169 years since the beginning of the first opium war back in 1840.

And according to one expert, to symbolize those 169 years, China's color guard marched exactly 169 paces to the center of Tiananmen Square to raise the flag. Also, an even more direct example was back in 1992 when the high school history curriculum was rewritten. high schools adopting this narrative from modern Chinese history. It read, And there are many more examples of this. I mean, you have things like the broken opium pipe monument

outside of the Opium War Museum. The museum guide calls it a symbol of Chinese resistance to foreign invasion. Or for example, that palace that the British and French destroyed back in 1860, China has left that untouched to remind people of the past. Even in the early 2000s, some Chinese leaders viewed a couple international incidents between them

and the US like a conspiracy. Basically, they thought that the US was causing international incidents on purpose, but claiming them as an accident. And there are a lot more, but it brings us back to how China acts in the South China Sea. Basically, many experts see China as being especially hostile to other Western countries getting involved in the area, in part because of the century of humiliation and what it reminds the Chinese of. As we began to dig more into the disagreements in the South China Sea, we found that this past was a fundamental way to understand Chinese policy and attitudes towards the world

and that might have been front of mind for some Chinese leaders when the US sailed destroyers around the region in January for, quote, "'Freedom of Navigation' exercises." But as is pretty much always the case, we're gonna have to wait to see what develops. Will the disputes in the South China Sea actually resolve themselves?

If so, for how long till the next thing? Or, I mean, is that it? Will it always be a sore spot for China and the world? And so with that, like I always try to do with the show and these videos, I want to pass the question off to you. What are your thoughts? What do you think about the situation we're seeing now at hand? What do you think about the motivation? Do you think it's just about power and money and resources? Or do you think that their past is also playing a role? If so, is it a big factor, a small factor? Yeah, main point. Let me know what you're thinking. Also, remember while you're at it, if you like this video, you like getting these extra dives into the news, you like just in general

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