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这几天观看中国媒体有关卡扎菲命运的报道与评论，让人觉得这位利比亚独裁者之死始终牵扯着遥远的东方大国——中国的每一根神经。只是官方与民间的反应有如冰火两重天，民间用各种方式表达快意，官方则用各种说法强调利比亚内战的代价以及不人道，硬将这场人民自发的反抗说成是西方为了石油的阴谋。
其中最有信息含量的应该是这么一些文章： “卡扎菲留给利比亚五大难题：政治经济重建存悬念”，“血淋淋的卡扎菲警示中东 欧美根本不可信”，这两篇文章看起来是为利比亚人民担心，但实际上却完全是设身处地之言，充满了对本国人民及国际体系的恐惧。
先说“五大难题”一文。在西方等正常国家眼中卡扎菲那些怪异残暴之行，在这篇文章的作者眼中却被视为“特立独行”。文章列出的“五大难题”依次是新政府的产生、如何结束内战，经济重建、战争红利如何分配，如何重返国际社会等。这些问题有些确实存在，但无一不被作者夸大成几乎不可解决之难题。比如“利比亚的国名由‘大阿拉伯利比亚社会主义民众国’改为简单的‘利比亚’”，作者认为这是“国家发展道路尚未确定”，就未免有些杞人忧天了；军人脱军装本也不是大问题，因为反对武装本来就非正规军人；卡扎菲之死意味内战结束，但作者却还要假想出无数忠诚者要为卡氏奋战。部落与部族矛盾，卡扎菲在世就一直存在，并非新政府带来的问题。至于“如何重返国际社会”这个问题，则完全是作者臆想出来的问题，因为美国、欧盟甚至俄罗斯等国都早就承认利比亚过渡委员会为合法政府。只是因为中国政府与利比亚过渡委的关系始终疙疙瘩瘩。所以真实的问题应该是中国如何在“利比亚重建”中寻找一席位置，尽可能延续中国在卡扎菲时期的一些利益关系。
“血淋淋的卡扎菲警示中东”一文，则赤裸裸地表达了权力者对失去权力的担忧，看起来是说“卡扎菲的命运或许强烈的提醒也门总统萨利赫，叙利亚总统巴沙尔，千万不能交权，千万不能示弱，因为一旦交权或者示弱，结局会很悲惨，一旦打输了就什么都没了”，但实际上是在抒发自身的恐惧。作者的良策是：一是要这些国家找“强悍的大哥罩着”，言下之意是要这些国家的专制政府团结在中国这位“带头大哥”周围；二是“一定要搞定自己国内的反对派，不能让他们成为带路党”，防止他们与境外势力勾结；三是要团结人民；四是绝对不要相信欧美列强。其中除了第三点是空话（人民与当局已经离心离德）之外，第一点虽然是中国政府所愿，但这些中东国家未必就认中国作“带头大哥”。二、三两点则是北京早就在戮力推行的“维稳大政”。
分析至此，任何心智正常的人都明白，这些文章并非真代卡扎菲这位过气的“朋友”鸣不平——中国外交部于10月23日由非洲司司长卢沙野出面声明“卡扎菲不是中国的朋友”，而是代北京政权的未来在担忧。至于这样表达担忧是否妥当或有失体面，看起来北京似乎也乱了章程。
以前萨达姆的专制独裁政权被美国发动的伊战推翻，中国将这场以反恐战争形式出现的民主与独裁之战说成是外部势力干预的结果，这一说法使得中国人很难分清其中是非。但这次利比亚内战是在人民已经起来、凭借自身力量很难取胜并吁请国际社会介入，谈不上是外部势力强行干预。至于其他的专制者在看到卡扎菲的下场之后，是主动放弃政权还是继续顽抗，则完全取决于他们自身对国内局势的判断。我相信，北京提示这些国家不可信任欧美，但在这些国家的掌权者眼中，北京可能更不可相信，这从他们将搜刮来的资产全数存放欧美国家银行可证。在“第三波民主化”及今年的“阿拉伯之春”中，北京不仅从未支持收留过任何一位好朋友，甚至缺乏美国及欧洲几个大国的斡旋能力。
中国方面（并非民间）在卡扎菲之死上有个最大的遗憾，那就是虽然早知卡扎菲失国在即，但希望其履行诺言，战死在沙场上，以保“反美英雄”风采，供鼓励驱策同类以用。没承想独裁者个个都是懦夫，大权在握时均视他人生命如草芥，随意杀人几成家常便饭，何尝想到过要珍视他人生命？但临到自己面临灭亡之际，却分外留恋人世，几乎都不愿选择自杀以保尊严。萨达姆如此，卡扎菲也如此，不是被人从地窖里揪出来，就是在下水管道里被抓，所谓“反美英雄”风采荡然无存，让同类颜面尽丧。
至于中国有人呼吁要善待卡扎菲的尸体，这方面倒是不劳中国方面操心了。因为在政治翻盘后羞辱失败者的尸体这种方法已为现代文明所不取，利比亚过渡政府已经表示要将卡扎菲尸体交还给卡氏家族。但有“掘墓鞭尸”之传统的中国却很难说，“文革”时期，中共信任的红卫兵不仅辱及大成至圣文先王孔子与清官楷模包拯遗骨，就连中共第三任总书记瞿秋白的遗骨也被掘出来并称为“狗骨”展示，这就是周恩来与邓小平都要将骨灰撒入江河湖海的主要原因。但我想，要想根除这种侮辱遗体的陋习，请先从善待活人、尤其是政治反对派开始吧。
The Downfall of Gaddafi overshadows Beijing
The Downfall of Gaddafi overshadows Beijing
By He Qinglian on Oct 24, 2011
[translated from http://voachineseblog.com/heqinglian/2011/10/gadhafis-death-and-beijing/]
http://hqlenglish.blogspot.com/2011/10/downfall-of-gaddafi.html
Reading reports and commentaries about Muammar Gaddafi by Chinese media, I got the impression that somehow the death of this dictator gets on every nerve of China, the distant nation in the East. While the Chinese public cheer his downfall in all sorts of ways, the reaction from the government cannot be more different: by resorting to various expressions to stress the cost, and the cruelty of Libyan civil war, the officials deliberately portray this spontaneous resistance of the people as a Western plot to get oil.
Among those articles by China’s mouthpieces, the following two are loaded with the largest amount of message. “The Five puzzles Gaddafi left behind in Libya” and “Gaddafi all over in blood: a warning sign to the Middle East that Europe and the United States are utterly untrustworthy”. On the face of it, these two articles showed concern for the Libyan people, but in reality the two articles revealed the fear the authors have toward their compatriots and the international system.
Let’s start with the article “The Five puzzles Gaddafi left behind in Libya”. Muammar Gaddafi ‘s behavior, seen in the eyes of normal countries of the West as bizarre and brutal, was what the author seen as “idiosyncratic”. The five puzzles listed out in the article included: the formation of a new government, the mean to end the civil war, the distribution of war bonus, and the way to return to the international community.
While some of these are genuine problems, the author has blown them all out of proportion into nearly unsolvable deadlocks.
For example, the author saw the country’s changes of name from “the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya” to “Libya” as an indication of “uncertainty in how the country is to move forward”. This view is somewhat like screaming “the sky is falling”.
The uprising forces’ taking off their uniform was not something to make a fuss out of either, they are not formal soldiers in the first place after all. And instead of seeing the death of Muammar Gaddafi as a sign that the civil war has ended, the author imagines there are still numerous forces loyal to the toppled leader that would keep fighting for him.
As for the conflict between different tribes, this problem was already there when Muammar Gaddafi was in power, it wasn’t brought about by the new government. And the question of how Libya is to return to the international community is a puzzle created out of the author’s imagination: the United States, the European Union, and even Russia have recognized the TNC as the legitimate government, with China the only country that hasn’t completely sorted out its relation with the TNC.
Hence the real issue should be how China is to secure a position in “rebuilding Libya”, and how to maintain China’s interests since the time of Muammar Gaddafi.
And the article “Gaddafi all over in blood” expressed unreservedly the worry those in power have about losing it. It read as if the writer was saying the fate of Muammar Gaddafi may be a powerful reminder to Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh, and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, that they should never surrender their power, that they should never show signs of weakness, otherwise they would have to face a miserable end. Once they lose the fight everything would be lost. But these are very much China’s own fear.
To prevent these from happening, he offered four suggestions to those dictators: first, these countries seek patronage from a “mighty big brother”, that’s to say, these autocratic regimes should look to China and form an alliance with it; second, to prevent the oppositions inside their countries from collaborating with external forces in overthrowing their governments, these countries should “fix” the oppositions; third, unite the people; and fourth, never trust European powers and the United States.
Of these four suggestions, the third one is empty talk: the people in those countries are already at odds with their government. The first one is what China wish for, but it is not likely that these Middle East countries would look at China that way. As for the second suggestion, it actually means the policy to “maintain stability”, one that Beijing has put into practice all along.
People should be able to see these articles are written not with the purpose of mourning an “old friend” – Director-general of Department of African Affairs of China’s Foreign Ministry, Lu Shaye, had stated on October 23 that Muammar Gaddafi was not a friend of China”. Instead, these articles revealed Beijing’s worries about its future. But whether revealing the worries this way is appropriate or graceful, Beijing seems to be so at a loss that it didn’t think this over.
When Saddam Hussein’s autocratic regime was toppled by U.S. led coalition forces, China said it was the result of external forces’ intervention, a statement that made the Chinese people hard to determine the correct picture there.
This time round, the Libyan people have already stood up against the regime, only that they could hardly win the battle on their own and they appealed to international community to step in, Beijing could not say it’s another forceful intervention from external forces. Whether the remaining dictators choose to step down or to keep fighting after they saw the end of Muammar Gaddafi would be up to their understanding of the situations inside their countries.
Beijing warns these countries not to trust Europe and the United States. But I believe that in the eyes of dictators in these countries, Beijing may be even less trustworthy. One can tell this simply by the fact that they deposit all the funds they amassed with banks in Europre and the United States.
During the Third Wave of Democratization and the Arab Spring this year, Beijing has not offer support or shelter to any of it good friends; and it hasn’t the power to mediate like the United States and major powers in Europe do.
The greatest disappointment China, excluding its general public, has on the death of Gaddafi was that, while it became aware of Muammar Gaddafi’s inevitable downfall long ago, it wished he would honor his words and died on the battle ground, so that his image of “Anti-American hero” could be preserved and could be used as an example to encourage others of its kind.
Yet it didn’t realize that all dictators are cowards. They couldn’t care less about the lives of others when they are in power, giving out orders to kill is just part of their daily business. But when they themselves are doomed, dictators would have the strongest desire to stay alive. Almost none of the dictators would choose to take their own lives to preserve their own dignity. Saddam Hussein didn’t take his life. So didn’t Muammar Gaddafi. They were either dragged out from the cellar or were caught inside the sewer. So much for their image of “anti-American hero”. The way they died bought total disgrace on others of their kind.
Some in China urged that the body of Gaddafi be treated nicely. I would say this is what China doesn’t have to worry about. Modern civilization would not insult the corpse of those who had been overthrown. The Libyan transitional government has already pleadged to give the body of Muammar Gaddafi back to his family.
But whether China, a country with the tradition of “digging up graves to flog the dead”, would treat nicely the body of fallen opponents would be hard to say. During the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards didn’t just destroy the tombs of Confucius and Bao Zheng, an official from Song dynasty who was best known for integrity in China; they also dug out and displayed in public the remains of Qu Qiubai, the third general secretary of the CCP, calling those dog bones.
This was the main reason Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping requested that their cremated ashes be scattered into the sea. But then I think, if China’s to curb the ugly custom of insulting the dead, it may as well begin with treating nicely the living, and in particular the political opposition.
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这几天观看中国媒体有关卡扎菲命运的报道与评论，让人觉得这位利比亚独裁者之死始终牵扯着遥远的东方大国——中国的每一根神经。只是官方与民间的反应有如冰火两重天，民间用各种方式表达快意，官方则用各种说法强调利比亚内战的代价以及不人道，硬将这场人民自发的反抗说成是西方为了石油的阴谋。
其中最有信息含量的应该是这么一些文章： “卡扎菲留给利比亚五大难题：政治经济重建存悬念”，“血淋淋的卡扎菲警示中东 欧美根本不可信”，这两篇文章看起来是为利比亚人民担心，但实际上却完全是设身处地之言，充满了对本国人民及国际体系的恐惧。
先说“五大难题”一文。在西方等正常国家眼中卡扎菲那些怪异残暴之行，在这篇文章的作者眼中却被视为“特立独行”。文章列出的“五大难题”依次是新政府的产生、如何结束内战，经济重建、战争红利如何分配，如何重返国际社会等。这些问题有些确实存在，但无一不被作者夸大成几乎不可解决之难题。比如“利比亚的国名由‘大阿拉伯利比亚社会主义民众国’改为简单的‘利比亚’”，作者认为这是“国家发展道路尚未确定”，就未免有些杞人忧天了；军人脱军装本也不是大问题，因为反对武装本来就非正规军人；卡扎菲之死意味内战结束，但作者却还要假想出无数忠诚者要为卡氏奋战。部落与部族矛盾，卡扎菲在世就一直存在，并非新政府带来的问题。至于“如何重返国际社会”这个问题，则完全是作者臆想出来的问题，因为美国、欧盟甚至俄罗斯等国都早就承认利比亚过渡委员会为合法政府。只是因为中国政府与利比亚过渡委的关系始终疙疙瘩瘩。所以真实的问题应该是中国如何在“利比亚重建”中寻找一席位置，尽可能延续中国在卡扎菲时期的一些利益关系。
“血淋淋的卡扎菲警示中东”一文，则赤裸裸地表达了权力者对失去权力的担忧，看起来是说“卡扎菲的命运或许强烈的提醒也门总统萨利赫，叙利亚总统巴沙尔，千万不能交权，千万不能示弱，因为一旦交权或者示弱，结局会很悲惨，一旦打输了就什么都没了”，但实际上是在抒发自身的恐惧。作者的良策是：一是要这些国家找“强悍的大哥罩着”，言下之意是要这些国家的专制政府团结在中国这位“带头大哥”周围；二是“一定要搞定自己国内的反对派，不能让他们成为带路党”，防止他们与境外势力勾结；三是要团结人民；四是绝对不要相信欧美列强。其中除了第三点是空话（人民与当局已经离心离德）之外，第一点虽然是中国政府所愿，但这些中东国家未必就认中国作“带头大哥”。二、三两点则是北京早就在戮力推行的“维稳大政”。
分析至此，任何心智正常的人都明白，这些文章并非真代卡扎菲这位过气的“朋友”鸣不平——中国外交部于10月23日由非洲司司长卢沙野出面声明“卡扎菲不是中国的朋友”，而是代北京政权的未来在担忧。至于这样表达担忧是否妥当或有失体面，看起来北京似乎也乱了章程。
以前萨达姆的专制独裁政权被美国发动的伊战推翻，中国将这场以反恐战争形式出现的民主与独裁之战说成是外部势力干预的结果，这一说法使得中国人很难分清其中是非。但这次利比亚内战是在人民已经起来、凭借自身力量很难取胜并吁请国际社会介入，谈不上是外部势力强行干预。至于其他的专制者在看到卡扎菲的下场之后，是主动放弃政权还是继续顽抗，则完全取决于他们自身对国内局势的判断。我相信，北京提示这些国家不可信任欧美，但在这些国家的掌权者眼中，北京可能更不可相信，这从他们将搜刮来的资产全数存放欧美国家银行可证。在“第三波民主化”及今年的“阿拉伯之春”中，北京不仅从未支持收留过任何一位好朋友，甚至缺乏美国及欧洲几个大国的斡旋能力。
中国方面（并非民间）在卡扎菲之死上有个最大的遗憾，那就是虽然早知卡扎菲失国在即，但希望其履行诺言，战死在沙场上，以保“反美英雄”风采，供鼓励驱策同类以用。没承想独裁者个个都是懦夫，大权在握时均视他人生命如草芥，随意杀人几成家常便饭，何尝想到过要珍视他人生命？但临到自己面临灭亡之际，却分外留恋人世，几乎都不愿选择自杀以保尊严。萨达姆如此，卡扎菲也如此，不是被人从地窖里揪出来，就是在下水管道里被抓，所谓“反美英雄”风采荡然无存，让同类颜面尽丧。
至于中国有人呼吁要善待卡扎菲的尸体，这方面倒是不劳中国方面操心了。因为在政治翻盘后羞辱失败者的尸体这种方法已为现代文明所不取，利比亚过渡政府已经表示要将卡扎菲尸体交还给卡氏家族。但有“掘墓鞭尸”之传统的中国却很难说，“文革”时期，中共信任的红卫兵不仅辱及大成至圣文先王孔子与清官楷模包拯遗骨，就连中共第三任总书记瞿秋白的遗骨也被掘出来并称为“狗骨”展示，这就是周恩来与邓小平都要将骨灰撒入江河湖海的主要原因。但我想，要想根除这种侮辱遗体的陋习，请先从善待活人、尤其是政治反对派开始吧。
The Downfall of Gaddafi overshadows Beijing
The Downfall of Gaddafi overshadows Beijing
By He Qinglian on Oct 24, 2011
[translated from http://voachineseblog.com/heqinglian/2011/10/gadhafis-death-and-beijing/]
http://hqlenglish.blogspot.com/2011/10/downfall-of-gaddafi.html
Reading reports and commentaries about Muammar Gaddafi by Chinese media, I got the impression that somehow the death of this dictator gets on every nerve of China, the distant nation in the East. While the Chinese public cheer his downfall in all sorts of ways, the reaction from the government cannot be more different: by resorting to various expressions to stress the cost, and the cruelty of Libyan civil war, the officials deliberately portray this spontaneous resistance of the people as a Western plot to get oil.
Among those articles by China’s mouthpieces, the following two are loaded with the largest amount of message. “The Five puzzles Gaddafi left behind in Libya” and “Gaddafi all over in blood: a warning sign to the Middle East that Europe and the United States are utterly untrustworthy”. On the face of it, these two articles showed concern for the Libyan people, but in reality the two articles revealed the fear the authors have toward their compatriots and the international system.
Let’s start with the article “The Five puzzles Gaddafi left behind in Libya”. Muammar Gaddafi ‘s behavior, seen in the eyes of normal countries of the West as bizarre and brutal, was what the author seen as “idiosyncratic”. The five puzzles listed out in the article included: the formation of a new government, the mean to end the civil war, the distribution of war bonus, and the way to return to the international community.
While some of these are genuine problems, the author has blown them all out of proportion into nearly unsolvable deadlocks.
For example, the author saw the country’s changes of name from “the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya” to “Libya” as an indication of “uncertainty in how the country is to move forward”. This view is somewhat like screaming “the sky is falling”.
The uprising forces’ taking off their uniform was not something to make a fuss out of either, they are not formal soldiers in the first place after all. And instead of seeing the death of Muammar Gaddafi as a sign that the civil war has ended, the author imagines there are still numerous forces loyal to the toppled leader that would keep fighting for him.
As for the conflict between different tribes, this problem was already there when Muammar Gaddafi was in power, it wasn’t brought about by the new government. And the question of how Libya is to return to the international community is a puzzle created out of the author’s imagination: the United States, the European Union, and even Russia have recognized the TNC as the legitimate government, with China the only country that hasn’t completely sorted out its relation with the TNC.
Hence the real issue should be how China is to secure a position in “rebuilding Libya”, and how to maintain China’s interests since the time of Muammar Gaddafi.
And the article “Gaddafi all over in blood” expressed unreservedly the worry those in power have about losing it. It read as if the writer was saying the fate of Muammar Gaddafi may be a powerful reminder to Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh, and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, that they should never surrender their power, that they should never show signs of weakness, otherwise they would have to face a miserable end. Once they lose the fight everything would be lost. But these are very much China’s own fear.
To prevent these from happening, he offered four suggestions to those dictators: first, these countries seek patronage from a “mighty big brother”, that’s to say, these autocratic regimes should look to China and form an alliance with it; second, to prevent the oppositions inside their countries from collaborating with external forces in overthrowing their governments, these countries should “fix” the oppositions; third, unite the people; and fourth, never trust European powers and the United States.
Of these four suggestions, the third one is empty talk: the people in those countries are already at odds with their government. The first one is what China wish for, but it is not likely that these Middle East countries would look at China that way. As for the second suggestion, it actually means the policy to “maintain stability”, one that Beijing has put into practice all along.
People should be able to see these articles are written not with the purpose of mourning an “old friend” – Director-general of Department of African Affairs of China’s Foreign Ministry, Lu Shaye, had stated on October 23 that Muammar Gaddafi was not a friend of China”. Instead, these articles revealed Beijing’s worries about its future. But whether revealing the worries this way is appropriate or graceful, Beijing seems to be so at a loss that it didn’t think this over.
When Saddam Hussein’s autocratic regime was toppled by U.S. led coalition forces, China said it was the result of external forces’ intervention, a statement that made the Chinese people hard to determine the correct picture there.
This time round, the Libyan people have already stood up against the regime, only that they could hardly win the battle on their own and they appealed to international community to step in, Beijing could not say it’s another forceful intervention from external forces. Whether the remaining dictators choose to step down or to keep fighting after they saw the end of Muammar Gaddafi would be up to their understanding of the situations inside their countries.
Beijing warns these countries not to trust Europe and the United States. But I believe that in the eyes of dictators in these countries, Beijing may be even less trustworthy. One can tell this simply by the fact that they deposit all the funds they amassed with banks in Europre and the United States.
During the Third Wave of Democratization and the Arab Spring this year, Beijing has not offer support or shelter to any of it good friends; and it hasn’t the power to mediate like the United States and major powers in Europe do.
The greatest disappointment China, excluding its general public, has on the death of Gaddafi was that, while it became aware of Muammar Gaddafi’s inevitable downfall long ago, it wished he would honor his words and died on the battle ground, so that his image of “Anti-American hero” could be preserved and could be used as an example to encourage others of its kind.
Yet it didn’t realize that all dictators are cowards. They couldn’t care less about the lives of others when they are in power, giving out orders to kill is just part of their daily business. But when they themselves are doomed, dictators would have the strongest desire to stay alive. Almost none of the dictators would choose to take their own lives to preserve their own dignity. Saddam Hussein didn’t take his life. So didn’t Muammar Gaddafi. They were either dragged out from the cellar or were caught inside the sewer. So much for their image of “anti-American hero”. The way they died bought total disgrace on others of their kind.
Some in China urged that the body of Gaddafi be treated nicely. I would say this is what China doesn’t have to worry about. Modern civilization would not insult the corpse of those who had been overthrown. The Libyan transitional government has already pleadged to give the body of Muammar Gaddafi back to his family.
But whether China, a country with the tradition of “digging up graves to flog the dead”, would treat nicely the body of fallen opponents would be hard to say. During the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards didn’t just destroy the tombs of Confucius and Bao Zheng, an official from Song dynasty who was best known for integrity in China; they also dug out and displayed in public the remains of Qu Qiubai, the third general secretary of the CCP, calling those dog bones.
This was the main reason Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping requested that their cremated ashes be scattered into the sea. But then I think, if China’s to curb the ugly custom of insulting the dead, it may as well begin with treating nicely the living, and in particular the political opposition.
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