The Contradictions in Harry Wu

This piece first appeared in Asia Times. I wish to acknowledge the contributions of Professor Norman Matloff of UC Davis. In the '90s a group of us decided to pool our energy to debunk Wu, and Norman was the one to set up and maintain the website as repository of articles and op-ed pieces written about Wu that shed light on the dark side of this individual. This website has been a real blessing for me as I was preparing to write this concluding chapter of Wu's life.

Have you ever wondered what it's like to enjoy a long pee on someone's tombstone? Well, writing this piece comes close to that feeling.

When Harry Wu unexpectedly died while on vacation in Honduras, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi gave him quite a tribute. She said, “With his passing, the world has lost a global champion for freedom and democracy.” Well ahem, in light of more recent disclosures, may be not.

Recent reports, first in Foreign Policy (May 25) then in New York Times (August 14), described a morally corrupt person, not a knight in shining armor. Wu was accused of having absconded millions that did not belong to him and was to face charges of sexual misconduct in court. The heading from Foreign Policy said it all: “In death, a darker tale of extortion and sexual misconduct threatens to tarnish his legacy.”

These posthumous disclosures hardly surprised those of us in the Chinese American community that had been following his career. We always knew him to be a charlatan and a scoundrel.

But give Harry Wu credit for being a trailblazer. He discovered that he could make a nice living by saying nasty things about China. Sometimes his statements were believable because they were based on facts skillfully doctored or exaggerated. Other times, he simply made them up as he went; the more lurid he made it, the more compelling he became. The western media could not get enough of his stuff and members of Congress were the most ardent members of his fan club.

From a middling salary of a non-profit, Wu came into his financial windfall in 2007 when families of two Chinese plaintiffs sued Yahoo for illegally providing information to the Beijing authorities that led to their arrest and imprisonment. (Illegal that is from a US perspective.) At the House Foreign Affairs Committee public hearing, then chairman Tom Lantos castigated Yahoo as a bunch of moral pygmies. Wu was invited to the hearing as an interpreter for the plaintiffs.

The cowed company agreed to give $3.2 million to each of the two plaintiffs and $17.3 million to a human rights fund as aid for future Chinese dissidents. The fund was to be administered by Harry Wu and his Laogai Research Foundation. That was a big, big mistake.

Yahoo’s donation became Wu’s personal fortune

The plaintiffs had to sue Wu later in order to get some of that $3.2 million awarded to them. Other dissidents never did see any of the $17 million. Instead the tax returns for LRF showed revenues of $325k in 2006, which jumped to more than $18 million in 2007.

In 2008, Wu bought a building in Washington DC for slightly under $3 million to house his museum. In the museum were prominent displays of photos of Wu with the who’s who of the world including Margaret Thatcher of UK and Bill Clinton and China bashing members of Congress such as Nancy Pelosi, Chris Smith and Frank Wolf.

Wu was supposed to disburse $1 million per year as aid to dissidents but according to Morton Sklar, attorney for the plaintiffs, Wu never did. Sklar said to New York Times, “But Harry Wu saw the money as his own personal fund, to benefit his own activities.”

Jeff Fiedler, who helped Wu formed the LRF in 1992 and should know Wu better than anyone, left the board in 2011. He said, “Harry was uncooperative and saw the money as his alone. He became extremely unreasonable.”

Wu died while vacationing in Honduras and cause of death has not been publicly disclosed. Perhaps he would still be alive today if he did not come into all that “discretionary” funds for exotic vacations. Rather than speculating on what might have been, I have been following his career and would like to discuss the person that he became. How he lived his life can serve as a cautionary tale.

First an important disclaimer: I cannot vouch for the accuracy of anything I say about Wu that are drawn from his public utterances. The reason is because consistency in his public statements was never his strong suit. I stand behind everything else in this piece.

How did Wu ended up in China’s prison?

Just the explanation of how Wu ended up in China’s labor camp would be reflective of his carelessness with facts. At different occasions, Wu gave different answers. Sometimes he said he was persecuted because his father was a banker and therefore Wu had the wrong family background. But then he was asked why the government would allowed him to graduate from college in 1959 and did not send him to labor reform during the height of the anti-rightest movement between 1957 to 1959?

Oh then, may be it was because he voiced criticism of the Soviet suppression of the Hungarian revolt. But that timing did not work either since the failed revolt also took place in 1956.

Another version which Wu had sneeringly referred to as the official Beijing line was that after graduation, Wu was assigned to a government job that would make use of his training in geology. He was caught taking money from a co-worker’s purse and that was how he made his first visit to China’s prison.

According to his own autobiography, Wu was in various prison camps from 1960 to 1979. If so, Wu would have been among the first batch to be released and allowed to return to civilian life as Deng Xiaoping returned to power and China began its reform.

In 1985, Wu came to the U.S. He claimed to have accepted an invitation to UC Berkeley as a visiting scholar; it was a curious invitation that came without any stipend. He frequently made proud reference to the fact that he came to America with just $40 in his pocket. I could not find anyone at Berkeley that would admit to having invited Wu.

As an alternate explanation, Wu had a sister living in San Francisco and it was possible that she sponsored his immigrating to the US. Less glamorous than being a visiting scholar but it would explain why Wu was allowed to remain in the America as a permanent resident. He and his sister hadn’t seen each other for 30 years and quickly found that they couldn’t stand each other’s company. He soon left her home and found work at a donut shop in Oakland.

Wu discovered his calling

Somehow the next year Wu was invited to speak about his prison experiences in China before a group of students at UC Santa Cruz. He gave an emotionally charged presentation that impressed the audience and thus Wu unwittingly found his life long calling. No more making donuts, he could just talk about his experiences in China’s prison system.

Ramon Myers, curator of East Asian Studies at Hoover Institution on Stanford heard about Wu and met with him. Myers wanted to know more about China’s prison system and gave Wu a small research grant to pursue a study. More importantly, Myers gave Wu access to the archives at Hoover. Long after the research grant had petered out, Wu continued to brandish his affiliation as a Hoover Research Fellow, a business card and title that conveyed priceless legitimacy on to Wu.

Then in 1991, Wu met Jeff Fiedler who was at the time secretary-treasurer of AFL-CIO Food and Allied Services Trade Department. I was not there but I would guess that it was mutual admiration at first sight. Okay, that might be too strong a description but each had something the other wanted.

Fiedler had a personal mandate which was to disrupt trade with China in any way he could. His logic was flawed but simple. Namely, low cost goods made in China took away jobs from American labor force. Wu could provide the ammunition Fiedler needed and Wu craved the cover of legitimacy that big organized labor could offer.

Laogai foundation founded by AFL-CIO

They founded Laogai Research Foundation to be based in Washington DC. “Laogai” was Chinese terminology for reform through labor and was the term used in China for a particular kind of prison camps. “Research,” I am sure, was Wu’s contribution having learned the bona fides that came with that word. For the early years, the so-called Washington headquarter of the foundation consisted of an extension with an answering machine in Fiedler’s department located in the AFL-CIO building.

To continue to burnish his credentials, it was necessary for Wu to gather research material by making field trips into China. His highest profile visit was to take Ed Bradley into China for a piece on 60 Minutes allegedly to expose prison made goods from China. He apparently did the same with BBC.

By the time Wu was ready to make another clandestine visit to China in 1995, he was a known and wanted person by China’s public security. He tried to enter China’s Xinjiang by way of Kazakhstan and was caught at the border entry. A female companion from AFL-CIO was detained with him.

It was hard to understand why Wu brought along a Caucasian woman at a remote border crossing if he wanted to keep a low profile and avoid detection, but it turned out to be a stroke of luck for him. The Chinese authorities had no reason to keep the woman in detention and released her within days. She then told the world that Harry Wu had been arrested.

The timing of Wu’s arrest was also fortunate for him. The International Women’s conference was to be held in Beijing later in the summer and first lady Hillary Clinton was to be the keynote speaker. Washington’s position was that without Wu’s release, there would be no first lady going to Beijing. Without that negotiation, Wu could have been facing another 19 years in China’s prison. He had become an American citizen a year earlier, so you could say he was three times lucky.

Wu became a world celebrity

Wu came back to the U.S. a world famous celebrity. Going under cover to China was no longer an option nor necessary; Wu became a popular speaker on the circuit. He appeared on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno and was interviewed by Charlie Rose and spoke at schools and universities and of course testified before various sub-committees of Congress. (Anytime Congressman Chris Smith wanted to go on C-Span, he would call Wu in for a conversation.) His remarks became increasingly lurid and graphic and his anti-China position more extreme.

Shortly after his release from China, Wu joined the picket line at Boeing in Seattle. He was quoted by the local newspaper as saying, “The strike by Boeing members (of the machinist union) is really a strike against the Chinese government; a strike the American labor movement must win.” At the time the union accused Boeing of exporting jobs to China because Boeing agreed to subcontract manufacturing of certain sections of the 737 to China. (In retrospect, Boeing would not have made a fortune in airplane sales to China without the subcontract agreement.)

He led protesters before K-Mart stores claiming that most of the merchandise inside was made by prison labor in China. Cheap goods from China made by prison labor became an important high profile issue for Wu. To disrupt bilateral trade with China, Wu went around the country claiming that practically everything made in China came from the prisons. This was in the era before Apple introduced iPods made by Taiwanese contractors in China, and Wu could get away with extravagant claims before a poorly informed American public.

In 1998, James Seymour and Richard Anderson published a scholarly study of China’s laogai penal system, “New Ghosts, Old Ghosts.” The book was widely acclaimed for its objectivity and dispassionate analysis.

Their findings disagreed with Wu’s wildly disparate estimates of the number of prison camps in China and the number of prisoners. They estimated that China prison labor could not have contributed more than one-tenth of one percent to China’s GDP. The real difference was that theirs was a rigorous study based on accepted academic practices; Wu would not have known what that meant.

Wu took on the World Bank

In 1996, Wu led the protest against the World Bank for financing an irrigation project in Xinjiang. Wu charged that the project would benefit the laogai camps in Xinjiang. He found out that a Fan Shidong had been recently released from a Xinjiang laogai and was living in Hong Kong.

Wu flew to Hong Kong to meet him and offered to pay all his expenses if Fan would agree to testify before Congress against the World Bank project. Fan refused saying that the irrigation project would benefit the local Uighurs and had nothing to do with the prison camps. Fan later revealed his encounter with Wu to the ethnic press after he immigrated to the U.S.

As Wu basked in international recognition including Nobel Peace prize nominations and spoke in the European circuit as well as in the U.S., those that knew him intimately became increasingly disenchanted with his actions.

By late 1996, Ramon Myers, who made Wu a “Hoover scholar,” said to LA Times, “We do our work in a very fair, objective way. It doesn’t help us any when Harry Wu is affiliated with us and he’s peddling his stuff in every parliament in the world. I regret, frankly, that he was ever at Hoover.”

Chinese American community disenchanted with Wu

On one occasion Wu visited Columbia University to speak and receive some sort of recognition. While lining up for some refreshments, he was delighted to meet Li Qiang, a student at Columbia, who was originally from Shanghai. Wu said he was homesick for the opportunity to speak in their local dialect. Li took the opportunity to point out to Wu that contrary to his public remarks, China’s human rights conditions had never been better in the last 50 years. Wu said, “Yes, yes but the Americans know nothing. Let’s just talk between us.”

Even as Wu became more facile with his English speaking ability, he missed the fellowship of speaking to compatriots of his homeland. Ironically, the Chinese American community was increasingly outraged by his public remarks and activities. One of his best-known publicity stunts was to use a secretly taken video of an operating room in China performing an open-heart surgery and claiming that the video was documenting the process of harvesting of kidneys from prisoners.

Ignatius Ding, a leader of a democracy in China movement in Silicon Valley, spontaneously organized in response to the visceral TV images of June 4 in Tiananmen, was an early supporter of Harry Wu. By the end of 1996, he offered a rueful observation to the LA Times that Wu had no supporters from his own ethnic Chinese community, just members of Congress. Later I asked Ding why he made that comment. He said, “I support the cause of helping the Chinese dissidents but I cannot condone Wu’s methodology. He pushed the envelope way too far.”

It was not much later that Wu sold his home in Milpitas and moved to the DC area. Thus he left the largest community of Chinese Americans in the U.S. that shunned him to be near the Congressional community that adored him.

After Wu’s death, Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen from Florida who succeeded the late Tom Lantos wrote a eulogy on Harry Wu, “After a hearing on Yahoo’s collusion with Beijing in suppressing Internet freedom, Harry stepped in on behalf of those who had been imprisoned and their families.” She apparently was not aware of the charges that Harry stepped in not for anyone but his own pockets.

The tragedy of Harry Wu was that he didn’t just soak up all the funds that could have benefitted dissident families in financial distress; he also sucked up the oxygen from with other dissidents. His distortions and exaggerations corrupted the very issues that the dissidents wanted to raise against the Beijing regime. The truths that could have stood on their own merits and let the society decide were no longer possible as they were covered by the slime from Harry Wu.

Three birds of a feather

There are others that have made a career out of Harry Wu school of China bashing. Two comes to my mind. Gordon G. Chang wrote about “The Coming Collapse of China” in 2001. A decade later, China’s economy was on verge of quadrupling, surely not a sign of collapse? Undaunted, Chang boldly affirmed that he was merely off in his prediction and confidently predicted that the collapse will most certainly take place in 2012.

It is now 2016 and his fellow traveler, Peter Navarro came to Chang’s rescue. Navarro also affirmed that Chang’s prediction was just around the corner, except he was smart enough not to say when, thus leaving room to review the collapse question every ten years or so. It’s no coincidence that Navarro was also the person that produced the video tribute to Harry Wu’s life posted on the LRF website. Three birds of a feather flock together?

Featherweight credentials notwithstanding, their anti-China messages continue to find a willingly receptive audience, and they will continue to be interviewed by the media and invited to testify before Congress. And we Americans will continue to suffer from the endless charade (and parade) of charlatans.

Donald Trump has the GOP boxed in

This item first appeared in Asia Times.

According to Greek mythology, Narcissus was so much in love with his own reflection in the water that he fell in and drowned. In the case of Trump, America is in danger of drowning because of his grandiose sense of self-importance. Elders of the Grand Old Party are wondering whether they should organize the salvage operations before the shipwreck or after.

Even at the risk of incurring a 15-yard penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct, it’s hard to resist piling on Donald the Trump. This past week, everybody it seems has been dumping on Donald.

If Donald Trump loses the election, GOP elders will find it hard to explain why he hijacked the nomination and how such hijacking will never happen again

This war hero for president has been quick to remind us that by getting a deferment in the nick of time, he narrowly escaped capture by the Viet Congs. His tour of duty lives in his vivid imagination, as he has been quick to remind us.

His record of war service and sacrifice entitled him to deride Khizr Khan’s speech at the Democratic National Convention. Khan only wanted to compare the loss of his son, Captain Humayun Khan, who was killed in action in Iraq in 2004, with Trump’s alleged sacrifices.

Consistent with Trump’s rash and brash style, one of his handlers on national TV promptly blamed the death of the brave American, Captain Khan, on Obama and Hillary Clinton four years before President Obama was elected into the White House.

Trump himself could have said, “See, if I had been President then, I would have banned the entry of all Muslims and Captain Khan would still be alive today —probably somewhere in Pakistan.”

Trump’s religious and evangelical supporters have gone so far as to suggest that Khan is a secret member of the Muslim Brotherhood sent to the U.S. to infiltrate into the Democratic Party and undermine America.

The religious right of Trump’s camp seemed to have forgotten that Jesus said to love thy neighbors; he did not say to love only thy neighbors who are Christians.

At the garden of Gethsemane, the Roman soldiers asked Peter three times if he was a follower of Jesus. According to Joe Scarborough of MSNBC, Trump asked a foreign policy adviser three times that if we have nuclear weapons, then why can’t we use them? The religious right might appreciate the parallel and irony.

Drawing from the “me, me, & me” personality described by the ghostwriter of his best selling book, it is not far-fetched to imagine a Trump at the White House press conference before a worldwide audience. “Look at me folks, please look at me,” he says with commensurate pomp, “I’ve got my finger on the button, oops…”

It’s not fair to his candidacy to only treat it as a mere laughing matter. Trump for president has potential deadly consequences. Therefore the leadership of GOP (Grand Old Party) has a challenge before them.

Do they somehow repudiate him now or could they keep their collective heads buried in the sand and hope for the best? Perhaps if Trump somehow does win the November election, the GOP can pick up the pooper-scoopers and go to work then.

Since it won’t be in Trump’s personality to deal with the minutia of running a country nor the patience to dig into and understand the nuances of domestic and international issues, we can hope and pray that the vice president and White House staff would go about running the country behind the scenes.

They can easily keep Trump distracted by letting him soak up all the attention that only a POTUS can attract. The staff can even organize a daily parade down Pennsylvania Avenue featuring President Trump for national TV.

If, on the other hand, Trump were to go down in a massive defeat as many are now predicting, on post election, the GOP will have a huge challenge on their hands on how to regain the trust and confidence of the American voters.

It will be difficult at that point for the elders of the party to explain with any credibility as to how they let someone like Trump hijack the nomination. And how, as a new GOP rises from the ashes, hijacking the top of the ticket will never happen again.

By declining to endorse Trump in his speech at the GOP national convention — he got the limelight and his announcement for 2020 too —, Senator Ted Cruz has already decided to jump ship and push off from the impending shipwreck.

Cruz has been disliked almost as much as Trump by the party rank and file. The party elders probably would also want to fix the future format and process for nominations that would give candidates of substance the opportunity to strut their stuff and stand a fair chance of gaining the nomination without having to sing his/her own praise of me, me & me.

Speaking of jumping ship, some Republican luminaries have already announced that they won’t be voting for Trump. Some have even said that they would vote for his opponent, Hillary Clinton.

The list of defectors include Mitt Romney, former candidate for president; Meg Whitman, former candidate for governor of California; Barbara Bush, former first lady and wife of George W; Hank Paulson, former Secretary of Treasury; Richard Armitage, former deputy secretary of state; Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of NYC; and a list of Senators and House of Representatives too numerous to mention.

And oh yes, the men of the Bush family, George H.W., George W. and Jeb have all also publicly indicated that they would not be voting for Trump.

The extent of disaffection is unprecedented and mutual. Donald Trump declined to endorse the re-election of House Speaker Paul Ryan and Arizona Senator John McCain, himself former candidate for the presidency, for a long time before grudgingly doing so. Both prominent Republicans are undoubtedly having mixed feelings over his tepid endorsement.

According to Greek mythology, Narcissus was so in love with his reflection in the water that he fell in and drowned. In the case of Trump, America is in danger of drowning because of his grandiose sense of self-importance.

The party elders of the Grand Old Party are in a collective quandary. Do they organize the salvage operations before the shipwreck or after? Can they save the country and their party? Can they save the country if they sacrifice their party? Or, are we doomed?

Is Tsai Giving up Claims in South China Sea?

This first appeared in Asia Times.

The soap opera known as the South China Sea dispute apparently has more to run. The proverbial fat lady that sings the finale is nowhere in sight.

Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen has taken the lead role in the latest episode. While her initial objections to the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) ruling were regarded as consistent with general expectations, her subsequent action surprised many.

Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen (C) visits a La Fayette-class frigate at a naval base in the southern county of Kaohsiung, Taiwan July 13, 2016. Military News Agency/ via REUTERS

She objected to her government not being invited to the proceedings. She resented being called the “Taiwan Authority of China,”—she doesn’t even like to be known as leader of Republic of China on Taiwan. Lastly, she objected to the judges blithely ignoring Taiping’s natural features of a real island. So far, so good.

Then a strange thing happened. Almost immediately after the PCA ruling was made public, Taiwan’s coast guard boats set forth to patrol the waters around the Taiping Island as an expression of defiance. But Tsai’s military head commanded the boats already at sea to return to Taiwan.

The reason for a vigorous protest was that if the PCA ruling was allowed to stand, Taiwan was at risk of losing the internationally accepted 200-mile economic exclusion zone that goes with an island but not with any reefs, rocks or sandbars.

Taiwan fishermen defied Tsai

Five boats of Taiwanese fishermen, festooned with the blue, white and red national ROC flags, also set forth on the six-day, one-way voyage from Taiwan to reaffirm Taiwan’s ownership of the island. The Tsai government forbade the sailing claiming that they needed to apply for a permit 45 days in advance.

Half of the original ten fishing boats were intimidated by the government threat of punishment and did not sail. The other five decided to ignore the unreasonable regulation retroactively imposed. Upon arrival, one of the boats was not allowed to dock at the pier on Taiping.

Tsai’s reasoning for keeping the people on the fifth boat from going onshore was that the boat had working journalists for “foreign” entity on board. The so-called foreign journalists were well known Taiwan citizens based in Taiwan and employed by Hong Kong-based Phoenix TV.

All of a sudden, Taiping Island in the middle of South China Sea has become a militarily sensitive area in need of security measures against Taiwan’s own citizens. Pundits in Taiwan accused Tsai of not wanting any exhibition of nationalism that would offend the U.S. and Japan.

The fishing boats returned in triumph with samples of potable water taken from the wells on the island and sand from the island as trophies of their high seas journey. The fishermen received a hero’s welcome from the people but faced an uncertain future as they wait to hear the fine the Tsai administration will levy on them for their so-called breach of security.

Derision from the media has been growing daily. They accuse Tsai of giving up claims of sovereignty and the livelihood of current and future generations of fishermen in order to please her masters in Tokyo and Washington—hugging Uncle Sam’s thigh was their colorful expression.

Tsai’s approval rating plummeted

At the outset, 70% of the people in Taiwan were in favor of Tsai leading a contingent to the Taiping Island to plant the ROC flag for the world to see. She evaded the public clamor and did not make the flight. Instead, eight legislators from KMT side of the aisle did.

According to one of the latest polls, in just two months in office, Tsai’s approval rating has already plummeted to a record low of 8.4%. It took her predecessor, Ma Ying-jeou, four years to drop to a single digit.

Others credit Tsai with more devious scheme than just being weak and indecisive. Even though the airstrip on Taiping was constructed under Taiwan’s first DPP administration, by Chen Shui-bian, Tsai’s inner circle has been revisiting the question as to whether the U-shaped, dash-line claims of South China Sea continue to be relevant to DPP interest.

They concluded that by giving up on Taiping and claims of the U-shape boundary on South China Sea, DPP could make a clean break from the historical ties to ROC and common cause with Mainland China.  It would facilitate Tsai breaking away from the need to acknowledging the one-China consensus and finally laying a claim for an independent, albeit slightly smaller, Taiwan.

By allowing the only naturally occurring island to be redefined as a rock, no one can lay claim to a 200-mile economic exclusion zone in the South China Sea. Thus, in helping the U.S. and Japan accomplish their objective, which is to declare South China Sea as belonging to no one, Tsai is counting on the two “friends” in the event of armed conflict with Beijing.

Whether the people of Taiwan will go along with her strategy remains to be seen and whether Beijing will continue to allow Taiwan to enjoy a subsidy in the form of near $30 billion trade surplus also remains to be seen. Given her remarks in the exclusive interview with the Washington Post, which aroused the ire of the people both in Taiwan and across the strait, the future seemed dark.

Philippines having second thoughts

On the other hand, the Philippines is one country having second thoughts of being a proxy for the U.S. in the South China Sea dispute.

The U.S. has not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and has no claims in the South China Sea, not even a submerged coral reef. America needed a stand-in to litigate against China’s claims. That was Philippines.

Rigoberto Tiglao, formerly in charge of Philippines’ presidential office, now writes for Manila Times. He said the suit for arbitration was filed at the behest of the United States. He suggested that Washington needed to reimburse Manila for the $30 million spent on the arbitration suit.

The Permanent Court of Arbitration charged about $3 million for secretarial services that included the use of the hearing room at a rate of Euro 1,000/day. Besides the generous compensation for the American lawyer acting for Philippines, how much of the rest went into the pockets of the judges, he wondered.

That the American intervention has been way over the top is also the judgement of Alberto Encomienda, former official of Philippines Foreign Affairs department.

Antonio Valdes, former undersecretary of education, said a one-sided arbitration without the agreement and participation of the other party to the arbitration was meaningless. The ruling was merely a legal opinion without the force of law.

The PCA has been around for more than 100 years. On the average, it provided arbitration services for about three cases every 20 years. Most of the times, major powers ignored rulings that they didn’t like. The body rents space at the building in The Hague belonging to the International Court but PCA has no connection with the international court or with the UN.

Kerry saw the wisdom of bilateral talks

Even Secretary John Kerry saw the futility of pursuing the PCA sham ruling when the closing statement of the ASEAN conference in Laos omitted any mention of  the arbitration ruling that the Philippines just won. The closing statement was supposed to represent the consensus of the ASEAN members. He now liked the idea of bilateral talks between Philippines and China.

Does that mean he will honor the $30 million invoice from Manila? Who knows. At least the Philippines government by looking forward is betting that collaboration with China will lead to infrastructure investments worth many times the fee paid to PCA.

At this point, Tsai might be feeling a bit lonely. When the Post asked her about the decline of tourists from mainland, a non-trivial part of Taiwan’s local economy, Tsai rather lamely hoped that Taiwan could attract tourists from elsewhere.

As for the trade surplus with the mainland, Tsai said to the Post that the surplus is declining and in any case the mainland is becoming more of a competitor. She bravely claimed that Taiwan could develop its economy via other avenues independent of the relations Taiwan has with the mainland.

Tsai is no fat lady and she is not ready to sing the finale in triumph or tragedy. The drama rolls on.

Taiwan, a bystander victim in the South China Sea dispute

This was first posted on Asia Times.

Over the weekend, the BaoDiao folks in the Bay Area held a press conference to voice their protest against the South China Sea ruling by Permanent Court of Arbitration in Hague.

Supporters pose for photos with Taiwanese fishermen before setting sail to Itu Aba, which Taiwan calls Taiping, Taiwan’s sole holding in the disputed Spratly Islands, in protest against a tribunal’s ruling on the South China Sea, in Pingtung, Taiwan July 20, 2016. REUTERS/Damon Lin

The ruling has turned the largest island and the only one held by Taiwan, the Taiping Island, into a rock and denied the Taiwan government of the 200-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

BaoDiao is Chinese shorthand for the movement to defend China’s sovereignty over the Diao Yu Islands in East China Sea. The movement began in 1972 in response to the US handing over the islands to Japan. (The Japanese government calls them Senkaku Islands.)

According to the Cairo Conference and subsequent Potsdam Declaration, the terms of Japan’s unconditional surrender to end WWII include giving up all claims to outlying islands in the Pacific, Diao Yu Islands included. The American government reneged on the terms in favor of Japan at the expense of China.

The tug of war over the Diao Yu Islands continues to this day and BaoDiao chapters in various forms have proliferated around the globe wherever significant numbers of overseas Chinese reside, as well as, of course, in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the mainland.

A lighthouse is seen in Itu Aba, which the Taiwanese call Taiping, at the South China Sea, March 23, 2016. REUTERS/Ministry of Foreign Affairs/Handout via Reuters

Some of the original joiners of that movement were student hotheads in those days. Now, the remaining ones are senior citizens who nonetheless continue to be full of passion and feelings to defend what has rightfully belonged to China. The Bay Area folks mostly identify “China” as the Republic of China or Taiwan.

At the conference, after the organizers rose to present their prepared remarks, some 20 members in the audience were invited to speak. Each got up and spoke in agitation with rising decibels as they expressed their outrage over the acts of American imperialism against ROC’s sovereignty and national interest.

This group vehemently objected to the Permanent Court of Arbitration’s (PCA’s) capricious ruling that rendered Taiping Island (Itu Aba) from an island with 200 mile of EEZ into a rock with a mere 12 mile EEZ. The ruling was made despite Taiping meeting all the official qualifications of an island, namely the island has own sources of fresh water and can and has sustained human life for decades.

Conversely, the US NOAA claims that US possessions of Johnston Atoll, Palmyra Atoll and Kingman Reef do qualify as islands and the therefore the 200 mile of EEZ. None of the three has sources of fresh water and cannot sustain human life. Kingman Reef is even completely submerged at high tide. (These three “rocks” are located in the middle of the Pacific south of the Hawaii islands.)

Japan claims 200 mile EEZ on an outcrop located over 1,000 miles south of Tokyo. Thanks to the use of reinforced concrete to keep the sand from being washed away, Japan government has claimed Okinotorishima as an island. At high tide, highest point is about 6 inches above the ocean. Total area above the ocean is around 100 sq. ft. Needless to say, no fresh water and no way for humans to survive.

However, rocks in the possession of the U.S. or Japan become bona fide islands while a real island in Taiwan’s possession is merely a rock. The conveners were furious over the double standard and the betrayal by allegedly Taiwan’s two best friends, namely Japan and the US.

According to the most recent reports in the media, the Philippines government has requested from the US government the reimbursement of the $30 million spent by the Philippines as legal expenses and fees in filing the case with the PCA.

Apparently, the Philippines served as the stalking horse for Washington and the US has been behind-the-scene instigator of this suit for arbitration.

The official international recognition that Taiping Island and the U shape lines around South China Sea belong to China has been established since 1947. The US even assisted ROC in taking control of some of the islands from the Japanese troops stationed there during WWII.

To challenge China (ROC or PRC) on their claims of the U shape lines around South China Sea is a challenge of their sovereignty. PCA has no affiliation with the UN or with the International Court of Justice and has no legal jurisdiction to rule on issues related to sovereignty. This is why Beijing has ignored the PCA.

The 200 miles of EEC is important to the fishing industry and livelihood of the Taiwan people. The ruling, if allowed to stand, will jeopardize Taiwan people’s economic interest.

This is a clear example of how the might of a hegemon can overwhelm the interests of an island entity of 23 million people. Taipei was not even a party to the dispute submitted to the PCA and was unaware that Taiping Island was included in the litigation.

While Beijing will continue to build and expand the islands in their possession because PRC is strong enough to stand up to the US, Taiwan needs to find allies. In this dispute, the Taipei government shares common ground with Beijing and two sides should stand united in opposing the American hegemony, according to the BaoDiao protesters.

Commentators inside Taiwan are already criticizing President Tsai for acting soft and unwilling to stand up to the US and assert Taiwan’s rights on Taiping Island. They are accusing Tsai of being ready to give up ownership of Taiping Island just to stay on the good side of America—and not have to be an awkward buddy to Chinese President Xi Jinping.

The newly elected Philippines President Duterte takes a different view. He has already publicly said, “I want to work with China rather than the US. China has money and the US does not.”

Unlike his predecessor, he clearly understands being on the front line of conflict on the side of the Americans is not a winning proposition for the Philippines.

Advice to Mr. Trump: How you can make America great again

First appeared in Asia Times.

Dear Mr. Trump:

You ran for the President of the United States on the promise that you would make America great again. You haven’t said how, but that’s your promise.

Here are some suggestions for you to include in your coming acceptance speech to show that you are serious on delivering on your promise.

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump delivers a speech in Virginia Beach, Virginia U.S. July 11, 2016. REUTERS/Gary Cameron

Make America safe again

Before you can make America great, you need to make America safe again.

To that end, you need to find a solution that would stop the police from shooting African American civilians and black civilians from shooting back.

However, racism runs deep in this country and it may not be realistic for you to come up with a solution overnight to resolve a problem that has been around since the founding of our nation.

But, with a presidential order, you can mandate a total ban on the use of real bullets. Only rubber bullets would be allowed.

The amendment on the right to bear arms did not specify that the arms have to come with metal bullets. Soft rubber bullets would greatly reduce fatalities.

Detractors might argued that only the criminals would then have access to real bullets, but that wouldn’t be so if you ban all domestic production and the import of real bullets into the US.

Criminals intent on mayhem would have to smuggle in the metal bullets. Since you are planning to stop immigrants and other undesirables from entering America, they would be stopped at the border.

As part of the ban, you would mandate that folks could shoot each other only with rubber bullets made in the USA. No made in China rubber bullets allowed.

This would become a brilliant boost to the domestic economy. Rubber manufacturing centers in the heartland of America that used to make tires can restart again and make bullets.

The Great Trump Wall

You have also said that you want to build a wall on the border between the US and Mexico. Again, you haven’t said how.

Actually the only people with thousands of years of experience in wall building are the Chinese. Why not contract them to do the job? They can complete the wall on time and under budget.

The only challenge is how to finance the project. The Wall would not qualify as part of China’s Xi Jinping’s Silk Road initiative. And it would not be considered an infrastructure project that could be financed by the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.

You are famous for financing a great many real estate projects. Call this one the Great Trump Wall and you shouldn’t have trouble attracting the attention of potential investors.

There must be many would be investors that have not yet experienced what it’s like to invest in your projects, and would find being associated with your name appealing, and could be persuaded to invest in this one.

A foreign policy to make America great again

You have hinted that your foreign policy will differ from your two predecessors and indeed this is where you will have the opportunity to make America great again.

History will show that the blitzkrieg invasion of Iraq under George W. Bush was America’s worst miscalculation ever. Instead of a liberator’s welcome that we expected and we are hemorrhaging from a 13-year-long quagmire and the bleeding is still continuing.

His successor, Barack Obama, accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on the premise that he was going to restore order in the Middle East, but he turned out not to be up to the challenge.

He failed to contain the religious fanatics but allowed the jihadists to spread to Syria. Obama was so intent on imposing a regime change in Syria that he missed seeing the gestation and formation of ISIS in Syria right under his very nose.

He also jumped to the conclusion that Arab Spring was a positive outcome of Arab countries following the leadership of American exceptionalism. Instead, the vacuum in Libya has allowed ISIS to take control and the new regime in Egypt is worse than even under Mubarak.

In short, the two predecessors have left a mess for the next POTUS.

To begin to straighten the mess, it will require a different approach. With your complete blank record on international relations, you have a distinct advantage over your presumptive opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Clinton, as Secretary of State, was the author of Obama’s continuation of the disastrous strategy begun by Bush. You can legitimately argue that she is not likely to have any novel approach.

A new approach requires the full and complete American attention on the absolute and total defeat of ISIS. It means working with and not opposing other governments on the common goal of stopping the Islamic jihadists.

Some pundits point to the recent terrorist attack in Nice as a sign that ISIS is losing ground at home. That’s nonsense and the logic baffling.

A new approach to ISIS

Defeating ISIS means not just cutting off the head but every tentacle in every part of the world to make sure another head doesn’t regenerate. That’s why collaboration with every legitimate government is necessary.

If you are thinking why not just pull out all the troops and leave the mess in Middle East behind — that won’t do. Like the rule in the porcelain shop — we broke it — now we own it.

The Western European countries already own the refugee crisis that we Americans created. They have their hands full and do not have the political will or resources to tackle ISIS without us.

Furthermore, if we do not deal with ISIS in their home base, they will surely find us in our home. The attack on World Trade Center on 9/11 and more recently, the terrorist attack in Southern California, amply illustrate this truth.

You have expressed willingness to work with Putin of Russia. You should extend your willingness to China’s Xi Jinping. Both have the same common interest in putting down the Islamic radicals as we Americans have.

You can begin by calling back our navy flotillas from the South China Sea. These ships are wasting fuel and burning a hole in our defense budget for no other reason than defending a bogus notion — that freedom of navigation is somehow imperiled –created out of the fertile imagination of misguided policy makers in Washington.

Taking on the task of world leadership to defeat ISIS will win the world’s gratitude and make us great again. These are some thoughts for your consideration as you draft your acceptance speech and in the campaign to come.