Labour leader Chris Hipkins, who has committed his party to keeping New Zealand out of the AUKUS security pact if it returns to power, was born in September, 1978. That was almost 30 years after China invaded Tibet.
But while other people born since 1950 are aware of the invasion and its consequences, they obviously did not pop up in Hipkins’ school lessons – or perhaps they did, and he flunked his history tests.
Addressing the annual Labour Party conference at the weekend, Hipkins said any future government he leads would “restore New Zealand’s proudly independent foreign policy”.
“Decisions about New Zealand’s best interests should be made here at home, not in Washington, Canberra or Beijing.
“So today I can announce that under Labour, New Zealand will not be part of AUKUS.”
On Morning Report today, when questioned about his aversion to AUKUS, Hipkins was reminded that former Labour leader Andrew Little had brought China into his considerations on what our defence policy should involve. Little had said it would be naïve to think China does not pose a security threat to us.
Presenter Corin Dann, demonstrating his inclination to argue rather than question, asserted:
“Aukus clearly is part of pushback against an emerging power coming into the Pacific, isn’t it?
Hipkins replied:
“I think China is certainly more active in our region than they have been in recent times.
“There have been times when China has been more active in its history. But bear in mind that China has never invaded any other country…
“I think it’s a big stretch to say that somehow they are an immediate threat to New Zealand’s security.”
Germany wasn’t an immediate threat to the security of Europe in 1932, either.
But Hipkins is taking comfort from his belief that China has never invaded another country.
Tibet attests to that being bollocks, although maybe it did not come into the curriculum at Waterloo Primary School, Hutt Intermediate and Hutt Valley Memorial College (later known as Petone College), where Hipkins was educated before he completed a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Politics and Criminology at Victoria University,
In 1950, the newly established Chinese Communist Party launched an invasion of Tibet to incorporate it into the People’s Republic of China.
As a Harvard International Review article explains:
By seizing Tibet, China gained access to a multitude of rich natural resources and easier access to the strategically significant Indian border. Facing almost 40,000 Chinese troops, the young Dalai Lama was forced to recognize China’s rule in return for loose promises that the CCP would protect Tibet’s religious and political system.
The CCP never kept these promises, and on March 10, 1959, hundreds of thousands of Tibetans surrounded the Potala Palace in Lhasa to protest Chinese government occupation, marking the beginning of an ongoing Tibetan resistance.
The CCP swiftly suppressed the uprising, and the then-14th Dalai Lama was forced to flee in disguise, dressing himself in a Chinese uniform and escaping on foot with his family members and ministers.
But Tibet isn’t the only victim of Chinese aggression. As Wikipedia tells it:
In February 1979, Chinese forces launched a surprise invasion of northern Vietnam and quickly captured several cities near the border. On 6 March of that year, China declared that its punitive mission had been accomplished. Chinese troops then withdrew from Vietnam.
Diplomatic relations between the two countries were not fully restored until 1991.
Then there’s tiny Bhutan.
In July last year Chatham House published an article headed:
“Decisions about New Zealand’s best interests should be made here at home, not in Washington, Canberra or Beijing.
“So today I can announce that under Labour, New Zealand will not be part of AUKUS.”
On Morning Report today, when questioned about his aversion to AUKUS, Hipkins was reminded that former Labour leader Andrew Little had brought China into his considerations on what our defence policy should involve. Little had said it would be naïve to think China does not pose a security threat to us.
Presenter Corin Dann, demonstrating his inclination to argue rather than question, asserted:
“Aukus clearly is part of pushback against an emerging power coming into the Pacific, isn’t it?
Hipkins replied:
“I think China is certainly more active in our region than they have been in recent times.
“There have been times when China has been more active in its history. But bear in mind that China has never invaded any other country…
“I think it’s a big stretch to say that somehow they are an immediate threat to New Zealand’s security.”
Germany wasn’t an immediate threat to the security of Europe in 1932, either.
But Hipkins is taking comfort from his belief that China has never invaded another country.
Tibet attests to that being bollocks, although maybe it did not come into the curriculum at Waterloo Primary School, Hutt Intermediate and Hutt Valley Memorial College (later known as Petone College), where Hipkins was educated before he completed a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Politics and Criminology at Victoria University,
In 1950, the newly established Chinese Communist Party launched an invasion of Tibet to incorporate it into the People’s Republic of China.
As a Harvard International Review article explains:
By seizing Tibet, China gained access to a multitude of rich natural resources and easier access to the strategically significant Indian border. Facing almost 40,000 Chinese troops, the young Dalai Lama was forced to recognize China’s rule in return for loose promises that the CCP would protect Tibet’s religious and political system.
The CCP never kept these promises, and on March 10, 1959, hundreds of thousands of Tibetans surrounded the Potala Palace in Lhasa to protest Chinese government occupation, marking the beginning of an ongoing Tibetan resistance.
The CCP swiftly suppressed the uprising, and the then-14th Dalai Lama was forced to flee in disguise, dressing himself in a Chinese uniform and escaping on foot with his family members and ministers.
But Tibet isn’t the only victim of Chinese aggression. As Wikipedia tells it:
In February 1979, Chinese forces launched a surprise invasion of northern Vietnam and quickly captured several cities near the border. On 6 March of that year, China declared that its punitive mission had been accomplished. Chinese troops then withdrew from Vietnam.
Diplomatic relations between the two countries were not fully restored until 1991.
Then there’s tiny Bhutan.
In July last year Chatham House published an article headed:
China’s high-stakes incursion in the heights of Bhutan
Writers John Pollock and Damien Symon wrote:
A confrontation is fomenting on the roof of the world in a country that rarely warrants international attention.
In the tiny Kingdom of Bhutan, China is building villages in isolated, mountainous regions, upping the pressure on the capital Thimphu to yield contested areas to Beijing. In doing so, China risks a collision with South Asia’s largest state and Bhutan’s principal security guarantor, India.
Another article on this conflict – in Foreign Policy – is headed…
China Is Quietly Expanding Its Land Grabs in the Himalayas
Anchal Vohra wrote:
As the U.S. government has spent ever more of its time in recent years preparing to respond to any potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, Beijing has been busy slicing away parts of the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.
Over the last few years, China has built massive infrastructure with hundreds of concrete structures, military posts, and administrative centres in the region of Beyul Khenpajong, some 12,000 feet in the northern Himalayan mountains
And:
China’s blatant land grab of Bhutanese territory is just its latest move to control areas of significance in Buddhist culture, exploit a far less resourceful neighbour, and challenge its regional rival India in the Himalayas.
On October 22 this year, Reuters headlined the news that:
India, China reach pact to resolve border conflict, Indian foreign minister says
The report said:
NEW DELHI, Oct 21 (Reuters) – India and China have reached a deal on patrolling their disputed frontier to end a four-year military stand-off, the Indian foreign minister said on Monday, paving the way for improved political and business ties between the Asian giants.
The news came on the eve of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Russia for an Oct. 22-24 summit of the BRICS regional grouping, during which he could hold talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian officials said.
Relations between the world’s two most populous nations – both nuclear powers – have been strained since clashes between their troops on the largely undemarcated frontier in the western Himalayas left 20 Indian and four Chinese soldiers dead in 2020.
The two sides had since stopped patrolling several points along the border in the Ladakh region to avoid new confrontations, while moving tens of thousands of new troops and military equipment closer to the freezing highlands.
Constant skirmishing on the border dates back to the Sino-Indian Border War in 1962, after diplomatic efforts to settle disputes over the location of the border had failed.
After a series of clashes, China’s People’s Liberation Army troops penetrated deep into Indian territory in the eastern sector and wiped out a series of Indian fortifications in the western sector.
According to PLA records, India suffered over 8,000 deaths and China sustained roughly 2,000 deaths.
Afterward, Beijing and New Delhi agreed to a ceasefire and created a de facto 20-kilometer-wide (12-mile-wide) demilitarized zone along the border. The war is generally regarded as a Chinese victory and profoundly shaped India’s relationship with China to this day.
Providing that background information in a report in July 2020, the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission advised the US Congress:
Conflict on the Sino-Indian Border
China and India have engaged in a deadly clash along their shared border for the first time in decades.
The two countries have engaged in various physical clashes along the border multiple times before, though all conflicts after 1975 have been settled without loss of life.
Under General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Xi Jinping, Beijing has stepped up its aggressive foreign policy toward New Delhi. Since 2013, China has engaged in five major altercations with India along the Line of Actual Control (LAC).
Beijing and New Delhi have signed a series of agreements and committed to confidence-building measures to stabilize their border, but China has resisted efforts to clarify the LAC, preventing a lasting peace from being realized.
Then there’s Taiwan, the subject of constant threats from Beijing that it will one day take control of the country which it regards as part of China – by force if necessary.
As CNN reported earlier this year, concerns have been heightened in recent years by Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s increasingly bellicose actions towards the self-ruled island.
China’s refusal to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has only added to those fears.
Hipkins does not have to sign up to AUKUS, let it be said. But he does have to brush up on his knowledge of China before he makes his decision.
Bob Edlin is a veteran journalist and editor for the Point of Order blog HERE. - where this article was sourced.
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