‘Netherlands, Japan Adhere to China Chip Export Restrictions’ – Informatics – News

In historical perspective: it is simply the large amount of people, local resources that make China has always been a superpower for the last 2000 years with some interruptions sometimes from decades to hundred years, often due to bad choices of the reigning emperor and popular uprisings (famine due to crop failures due to climate change). When the Roman Empire was at its height, there was only one counterpart that was as powerful and even richer than the Imperium Romanum and that was the Han Empire. Roman writers wrote of the negative balance for Rome because large quantities of silver and gold disappeared through intermediaries in the Empire of the Seres (Serica: silk-producing empire also known as the Han empire). After the fall of Rome and also the mighty Han Empire, there was a second resurgence during the Tang: During this period, the surrounding countries such as Korea, Japan and Vietnam (annexed and sinified by the Chinese, imbued the country with Chinese culture , which you can still see today) and the Han script was introduced in Korea (Hanja) and Japan (Kanji). Japanese culture is simply infused with Chinese influences, most evident in the script, architectural style of ancient buildings, and traditional clothing, often taken directly from the Tang era. Like it or not, China has been and always has been an influential factor throughout history. The big difference from the old days is that China, after being humiliated during the colonial period, has just learned to be expansive now and not like the old days: we are the Middle Kingdom, you barbarians out of the center of civilization, you may come to learn and enjoy civilization, but we don’t feel like going to conquer other countries for resources on a large scale, because we already have everything in the perfect Celestial Empire. The idea was copied from the completely different choice that an outpost of Chinese civilization, Japan in situ, made to keep the barbarians out. If you want to defeat the barbarians, you must learn to handle their weapons (and therefore ideas). Through extensive modernization away from China’s adopted Confucian worldview, Japan has grown from an outpost of mighty China to a world power by constantly imitating the West. One consequence of that imitation is that at one point the Western concept of colonialism was also adopted with catastrophic consequences for the rest of Asia. China then fell victim to an incredible form of conservatism, where Confucian officials simply could not believe that the perfect and noble Celestial Empire needed reform, because what can be reformed if something is already perfect? The huge defeat in the Sino-Japanese War, in which Japan modernized and China did not, convinced the most conservative Mandarin of the time that reforms were needed… sadly too late, as China was then overrun by Western powers and a period of decades of China’s humiliation…… Now that China is becoming more and more powerful, there is a general opinion among the Chinese: NEVER that humiliation again. China will become rich and powerful and stop being taught, just as it was the center of civilization and power during the Han, Tang and Ming.

You need to know this fact to understand the current logic of how China sees the situation.