The White House on May 5 hit back at Beijing’s demand that US airlines comply with Chinese standards on how they refer to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau, dismissing the demands as “Orwellian nonsense.”
Beijing’s Orwellian bent continues to be on display.
The state-owned Global Times reported that online commentators have been complaining about a T-shirt sold by US clothing retailer Gap, showing a map of China. The map omitted Taiwan, Tibet, part of the South China Sea and Aksai Chin, a large disputed border area between India and China.
Gap on Monday apologized and withdrew the T-shirts. Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang (陸慷) noted the apology and said the ministry would be following the company’s actions.
Da Ai TV has withdrawn a historical drama, Jiachang’s Heart (智子之心), after airing only two episodes. The drama was inspired by the story of a Taiwanese nurse who served with the Japanese imperial army in China during World War II, when Taiwan was a Japanese colony.
Despite denials by Da Ai media development manager Ou Hung-yu (歐宏瑜), the decision to cancel the show reportedly followed pressure from China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, which was unhappy about the show’s favorable depiction of the Japanese army.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) maintains its political power through censorship and control of media through official outlets such as the Global Times. It is no surprise that the “omissions” in the map on Gap’s T-shirts were noted by Chinese online commentators. They are relentlessly fed the CCP’s propaganda about Taiwan belonging to China, as well as the rejection of dissenting voices. Neither is it surprising that official media outlets or China’s foreign ministry picked up on it.
In George Orwell’s dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, people’s minds are controlled by constant state surveillance, state-controlled historical revisionism and the pared-down, concept-poor language of “newspeak.”
The CCP subscribes to constant surveillance and historical revisionism. Its version of newspeak is the persistent repetition of a simple message. Pertinent to Taiwan, the messsage is: “Taiwan is part of China. Taiwan is part of China. Taiwan is part of China.”
However, historically and in terms of international law, there is little to commend that claim. It is certainly one that the majority of Taiwanese reject.
In Animal Farm, Orwell explored the power of messages and how its gradual and subtle modification can lead to the creeping extension of power. In the story, the rule “All animals are equal” becomes “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others” overnight, giving more power to the pigs.
The CCP’s model of governance is its own business. It cannot expect organizations, broadcasters or retailers from other nations to comply with its dictates.
In November last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) told a forum for foreign political groups in Beijing that China “will not import other countries’ models, and will not export the China model.” Since then, it seems the message has become “China will not import other countries’ models, and will not export the China model, unless deemed necessary.”
In other words, Beijing wants to have its cake and eat it.
Foreign companies bow to Beijing’s bullying because of corporate interests, while the governments of other nations concede to Beijing’s unilateral historical revisionism due to political and economic expediency.
Calling China’s tactics Orwellian is accurate. Being Orwellian, the normalization of the message and the gradual, almost imperceptible alterations to the narrative are pernicious. Not calling these out for what they are is the mistake.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
The military is conducting its annual Han Kuang exercises in phases. The minister of national defense recently said that this year’s scenarios would simulate defending the nation against possible actions the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) might take in an invasion of Taiwan, making the threat of a speculated Chinese invasion in 2027 a heated agenda item again. That year, also referred to as the “Davidson window,” is named after then-US Indo-Pacific Command Admiral Philip Davidson, who in 2021 warned that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had instructed the PLA to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. Xi in 2017