November 19, 2007:
There are
now over half a million Chinese businessmen, traders and workers in Africa, and
the number is expected to double in a year or so. Africa is seen as a land of
opportunity for Chinese, and the government encourages such migration. The
Chinese government is opening the way by making it easier for African firms to
export to China, and by selling weapons to any African government, no matter
how shabby that government's reputation. Inexpensive Chinese goods are popular
in China, although many Africans fear the Chinese are out to exploit them, as
other foreigners have done for centuries.
This year, Chinese firms, and the Chinese government, will invest over a
billion dollars in African projects. China is eager to get African oil and other
raw materials, and is offering to replace current deals with Western firms.
November 18, 2007: Taiwan has
ordered a billion dollars worth of upgrades to its Patriot anti-aircraft
missile systems, that will enable Patriot to shoot down ballistic missiles as
well. China protested that this was an unfriendly act.
November 17, 2007: The
government has agreed to have a warship visit a Japanese port for the first
time, on November 28th. This is part of a charm offensive, which has been going
on for over a year, to improve relations with Japan. Chinese officials won't
admit it publicly, but they fear growing Japanese military power. So does
Russia, which is one reason China and Russia have formed something of a
military alliance.
November 16, 2007: A U.S.
government report concludes that China is making a major effort to steal
American technology and military secrets, using the Internet. The Chinese government responded by denying
it was going after industrial technology, but said nothing about military
related operations.
November 15, 2007: The
government has warned military, and non-military, agencies to eliminate the
corruption in military demobilization programs. The military has been shrinking
for several years, and career soldiers who have been dismissed, are supposed to
receive retraining, money and goods (like clothing.) Corrupt officials have
been stealing some of this aid, and the demobilized soldiers have, in some
cases, turned violent. The government does not want a lot of disgruntled
ex-soldiers wandering around loose.
November 12, 2007: Several
thousand disk drives, manufactured in China, were shipped with a hidden spy
program on them. This is not believed to be an attempt at espionage, because
the computer virus in question is quite common, as these things go, and is
designed to seek out and steal online game password information, and transmit
it to a Chinese server. This sort of thing is rampant in East Asia. It has long
been feared that computer components manufactured in China could be
deliberately infected this way. But doing that, and not having the infection
detected, is extremely difficult. That makes it very risky, because if you are
caught, you lose a huge amount of export business, not to mention the increased
diplomatic tensions.
