World Affairs: From Terrified to Triumphant — How China Flipped 2020

World Affairs: From Terrified to Triumphant — How China Flipped 2020 世界事務：從恐懼到勝利—中國如何在2020年擺脫困境

It was the worst way to start a year for China. On the New Year’s eve of 2020, Chinese social media were full of rumors about re-emergence of SARS virus from 2003. Chinese New Year was about to begin in three weeks, which would involve hundreds of millions of people traveling all over the country. Xi Jinping had already warned Chinese officials a month earlier that the US-China trade war and sanctions would make 2020 a very challenging year. Now an unknown virus was about to decimate the economy and shred the China dream into pieces. 對於中國來說，這是最糟糕的一年開始。 在2020年的除夕夜，中國社交媒體充斥著關於2003年以後再次出現SARS病毒的傳言。農曆新年將在三週內開始，屆時將有成千上萬的人在全國各地旅行。 習近平一個月前已經警告中國官員，中美貿易戰和製裁將使2020年成為充滿挑戰的一年。 現在，一種未知的病毒即將摧毀經濟，將中國夢粉碎成碎片。

Worse, as time went on, China was not only left alone to fend for itself, but the anti-China forces piled on with Psy-ops. Social media attacked the Chinese people and blamed them for “eating bats” — a popular video of a Chinese blogger eating a bat soup went viral, although it turned out that she had the soup three years earlier in an island (Palau) thousands of miles away from China. Pundits and politicians gloated on TV that the pandemic would help the US and bring China to its knees. Trump bragged that the U.S. was the best prepared country in the world to face a pandemic. 更糟糕的是，隨著時間的流逝，中國不僅獨自一人自生自滅，而且反華勢力也充斥著Psy-ops。 社交媒體攻擊了中國人民，並指責他們為“吃蝙蝠”-一位中國博主吃蝙蝠湯的流行視頻廣為傳播，儘管事實證明，她三年前在數千英里的島嶼（帕勞）擁有湯 遠離中國。 權威人士和政界人士在電視上大張旗鼓地表示，這種流行病將幫助美國並使中國屈服。 特朗普吹牛說美國是世界上準備最充分的大流行國家。

https://worldaffairs.blog/2020/12/31/from-terrified-to-triumphant-how-china-flipped-2020/

US media, filled with Shadenfreude, kept saying “deadly coronavirus” (until it spread to Europe and the US) and shouted out malevolent things to mock and frighten China:

“CCP has lost its heavenly mandate”

“Novel coronavirus is China’s Chernobyl“

“China is Asia’s sick man (referring to a racist trope from the Century of Humiliation)“

“Coronavirus will end China’s role as global manufacturing hub“

China was accused of lying and hiding everything — origins and nature of the virus, how prevalent the virus was, how many were dying and so on. Even though China had warned the WHO on Dec 31, 2019 and released the full genome of the novel coronavirus by Jan 11, western media keeps repeating that China hid some truths about the virus. (Never mind that the SARS-Cov-2 virus was spreading in the U.S., as well as in France, Italy, Spain etc. all through December).

Twitter and Facebook in January and February were full of fake videos showing Chinese people collapsing and dying on Wuhan streets. When Chinese mobile companies lost 21 million customers in March, Americans shouted that all those people had died from COVID. Western journalists who were allowed to visit Wuhan wrote only gloom-and-doom stories. Later, even US politicians were spreading conspiracy theories about the virus escaping from a Wuhan lab. Chinese people living in the West were being physically assaulted by xenophobic and ignorant idiots.

It was a lonely, heart-wrenching, and an incredibly frightening moment for China. But the country ignored the judgmental, cruel world and came together as a family. That’s what Confucianism and collectivism (a core principle of socialism/communism) are all about.

China’s Incredible Response

China did the only rational and scientific thing possible: completely shut down Wuhan and even Hubei province (with 57 million people). Tens of thousands of doctors, nurses, volunteers, and even PLA soldiers were sent to Wuhan. People were restricted from leaving their homes; and communist party members volunteered to deliver food for millions of people. Doctors wore diapers and worked 14 hours a day, while sweating inside the suffocating PPE. Hi-tech corporations came to the rescue with drones to deliver food, robots to deliver medicines, big data to detect clusters, and AI to read CAT scans. The inimitable construction workers of China built two new hospitals in two weeks. People with mild symptoms were put in stadiums and college dormitories to stop the spread of the virus.

Everyone in China did their part. Corporations built mask and PPE factories in a week; and workers slept in those factories for weeks to ramp up production. Within a couple of weeks, Chinese scientists built huge labs that could do hundreds of thousands of COVID tests per day. Doctors worked meticulously, exploring different drugs — including Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) — to treat the new virus; and scientists were racing to develop vaccines. When big cities like Shanghai and Beijing had to shut down for 2-3 weeks, everybody cooperated and followed the guidelines. Later, when there mini outbreaks — like in Qingdao and Xinjiang, China would test millions of people in under a week. Test, trace, treat — China followed the basic principles.

After 76 days of incredible human drama, Wuhan came out of lockdown. Thanks to China’s “authoritarian”, “draconian” and “human rights-violating” measures, China had contained the pandemic and was ready to roar.

Meanwhile, the world was just coming out of its delusion. Having wasted precious three months gloating about China’s suffering, America started plunging into COVID19 lockdowns in April. The rest is history. By the end of the year, the USA had 20 million confirmed cases and 350,000 deaths.

Looking at COVID-19 deaths per million, China was 3 and the U.S. was more than 1,000.

This is how China ended 2020 — with celebrations and large parties of Merry Christmas and Happy New Year:

China’s other impressive achievements in 2020

Xi Jinping and Beijing officials must have spines made of steel. In spite of the horrifying events of the year, Chinese officials kept working on their individual objectives. Here are some commendable and unbelievable achievements of China in other areas:

Economy

China is the only major economy to have GDP growth in 2020 and the biggest growth in the next two years.

Opened up the financial services industry to Wall Street’s delight. Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, BlackRock, you-name-it all eagerly opened up numerous ventures in China.

Signed two landmark trade deals — RCEP and CAI.

RCEP is the world’s largest free trade agreement (FTA) and is Asia-focused. First time that Japan and South Korea have FTA with China.

CAI is a China-EU investment deal. While the incoming Biden team tried to stop the deal, Germany quickly wrapped it up just before the year end.

In both these treaties, notice that the U.S. is left out. Now, China is even ready to join TPP, which Trump quit.

Eradicated extreme poverty for the first time in China’s history! Zero percent, including Xinjiang and Tibet. That’s real human rights.

Donated countless number of masks, PPE, ventilators and diagnostic test kits to countries all over the world. Chinese experts traveled all over the world to train doctors and nurses. China donated and exported about 40 billion masks and 12,000 ventilators to the U.S.
Had record exports and trade surplus.
Stock market (CSI 300 Index) up 48%
Yuan up almost 10% from pandemic lows (from ¥7.18 to ¥6.52 per $1)
Record Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)
World’s #1 in IPO’s
Surpassed the U.S. in global Fortune 500 list (124 v. 121). (link)

Surpassed the U.S. as the European Union’s largest trading partner. And also surpassed the EU in GDP (not counting UK’s GDP).

China became the #1 automobile market in the world (for total number of cars)
Surpassed the U.S. to become the #1 box office in the world

Technology

Installed more than 700,000 5G base stations, accounting for 80% of the world’s market share.

Went to the moon and came back with lunar samples in just 23 days! (Chang’e-5)
Sent a spacecraft to Mars (Tianwen-1)
Had the most number of vaccines in Phase 3 trial; successfully tested in many countries like Brazil, Turkey, UAE etc.

Approved Sinopharm vaccine for use; and have promised cheap vaccines for developing nations (while the US and Europe have refused to do the same).

Announced that China will reach carbon neutrality by 2060.

Tested digital Yuan/RMB (DCEP) in many cities. This lays the groundwork for internationalization of Yuan in 2022.

Infrastructure

Controlled the massive floods that ravaged vast regions of China for many weeks. (Predictably, western media and many social media citizens drooled about the possibility of the Three Gorges Dam crumbling and destroying China).

Increased the high-speed rail (HSR) network to about 39,000 Km.

Xiongan Smart City made tremendous progress, including a new bullet train station

Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) kept advancing. Turkey is now linked to Xian, China. More than 1,200 freight trains per month link 92 European cities to China.

Here are are some photos of driverless (a.k.a self-driving or autonomous) subway trains, new metro stations/lines, battery-powered trams, highways, and bridges that China built in 2020. (Ask yourself why America can’t afford such luxuries anymore).

Geopolitics

China quietly stopped Hong Kong’s insurgents and put an end to U.S. shenanigans. Beijing called out Washington’s bluff about sanctions and passed the National Security Law, which also kicked out American spies and the fake NGO’s like NED, which specialize in brainwashing and color revolutions.

In the midst of all these problems, America’s vassal states — India and Australia — saber rattled in ominous ways. However, the border conflict with India was de-escalated, while letting both sides save face. Australia was spanked very hard as a warning to other vassals. If Australia slips into a recession, the next Prime Minister will be a lot less racist and uncouth. And perhaps Australia will be more careful about committing war crimes in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

China also made a momentous and long-term deal with Iran, cementing China’s influence in the Middle East.

Reasonable success in thwarting the persistent atrocity propaganda about Uyghurs in Xinjiang. China’s new extradition treaty with Turkey in 2020 should help capture some Uyghur terrorists who are fighting in Syria alongside of ISIS and Al Qaeda.

Trade deals RCEP and CAI have strengthened China’s inclusion and ties with Europe and Asia, thus diminishing America’s chances for proxy wars. The vision of Eurasia became much clearer in 2020.

Military drills and more strategic alliance with Russia in 2020 should improve china’s security posture.

Conclusion

If your neighbor’s house is on fire, you should help them. In Jan/Feb, the U.S. gleefully watched China burn and bragged about American exceptionalism. That’s when the US and the EU should have given generous aid to China to contain the pandemic. Then, from April on, western societies refused to learn anything from China. Filled with hubris and undeserved overconfidence, the West kept fumbling for months. Incompetent governments and irrational public couldn’t agree upon simple things like wearing masks or even if COVID-19 is real.

As the West imploded, China soared to the skies.

To put it succinctly, China had a stellar year. And with Trump’s loss, the U.S. is more polarized than ever before. By the time Biden’s administration gets its geopolitical strategy together, everyone from Asia to Europe would see the writing on the wall — that China will inevitably be the #1 economy soon. 2020 started out as a terrifying year, but ended up as the most pivotal year that sealed China’s unique status in the 21st century.