Perhaps all those who argued that China wouldn't risk their pageant to display the glory of China by attacking Taiwan were right. Which doesn't mean that China won't attack after. Or in a few years.
Of course, I responded to the protest that China wants a nice coming out pageant that if China was risking their partyt with other bad news separate from Taiwan, that reason to hold back wouldn't apply. Cue the scary music:
Protests spread from Tibet into three neighboring provinces Sunday as Tibetans defied a Chinese government crackdown, while the Dalai Lama decried what he called the "cultural genocide" taking place in his homeland.
Demonstrations widened to Tibetan communities in Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces, forcing authorities to mobilize security forces across a broad expanse of western China.
And the world is certainly noticing:
Protesters in Australia burned Chinese flags on Tuesday, demanding freedom for Tibet, following similar demonstrations in Europe and the U.S. against Beijing's crackdown on anti-government riots in the Himalayan region.
And to make things even more complicated, will Pelosi fan the flames by pulling a Bush 41 call to the Shias of Iraq to revolt against Saddam?
American House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi and Hollywood star and activist Richard Gere are in New Delhi are expected to show and express solidarity over the Tibetan cause.
So even without Taiwan spoiling the party, the party is in danger from Tibet. And have no doubt, the communist party won't tolerate a threat to their party rule:
For many people, China has become an easier and freer place to live over the past 20 years, but it remains the case that the Communist Party cannot tolerate any belief system that even implicitly challenges its monopoly over “right thinking”.
That's why Taiwan can't be allowed to go its own way. Taiwan is a threat to the party's monopoly and independence would make it obvious. So even as Peking faces a Tibet revolt or perhaps just an ugly suppression of unrest before it gets serious, Peking still has Taiwan to address, as Premier Wen Jiabao noted:
"We are opposed to the so-called referendum schemes for Taiwan's membership in the United Nations," Wen told a news conference in Beijing. "That would deal a serious blow to cross-strait relations, that would harm the fundamental interests of the people on both sides, cause tensions in the Taiwan Strait and threaten peace in the Taiwan Strait and the Asia-Pacific region at large."
So with Taiwan edging closer to formal independence and China's reputation already shaky from their support for the Burma regime and now the Tibet crisis that even our Left pays lip service to supporting, holding back against Taiwan may not be so critical to a good Olympics after all.
As I noted some time ago, if China crushes Taiwan, China might bring in Han Chinese to replace Taiwanese and send Taiwanese involuntary colonists to Tibet where they'll have a choice of becoming Chinese or losing to the Tibetans:
The Chinese will kill four birds with one stone--bolster legitimacy with a feel good campaign to recover lost lands; swamp Tibet and western China with unwilling colonists from Taiwan who will have no choice but to become Chinese just to survive in a hostile and isolated land; and empty Taiwan of independence minded Taiwanese to make room for new Chinese residents whose hearts and minds are already won. This might take some pressure off of China's cities who must cope with internal migration from China's rural areas by directing that migration to Taiwan.
Is this too cynical? Please. Remember, in the Korean War the Chinese government sent lots of former KMT soldiers into the war against American troops. It was win-win for China with former enemies killing Americans and Americans killing potentially disloyal soldiers.
Perhaps simply slaughtering civilians the old fashioned way will be done to consolidate mainland rule over Taiwan. Bad press can't be good for businesss and surely Peking would like to avoid that if they can. But make no mistake, there will be no hearts and minds campaign.
Mass population transfer is hardly a novel concept for communist regimes.
Or maybe China will try to salvage a pageant this summer by doing whatever it takes to silence the Tibetan protests and shield the news from the world as much as possible to muffle the impact.
But perhaps if a boycott wrecks the Olympics with Tibetans resisting Chinese rule and Taiwanese attempting to gain UN membership, China will chuck the hopes of engineering a coming out pageant for another decade until the sting of two brutal conquests wears off in the West.
