Many of their posts point out tremendous hypocrisy in the west's interactions with developing countries. As a citizen of the west, these criticisms are valid.
>This is ironic because enlightenment ideals would have assumed opening economic ties with China should have led to democratic ideals in China, but that didn’t pan out.
The idea that the west opened up with the goal of treating the Chinese equally, is on the surface true, but in reality misleading.... There is a lot of covert/overt activity that is primarily meant to result in regime change, something that I expect would be a negative outcome for the poorer people in China at this stage in development.
Many in the west are prescribing that a country forget the recent past and take the actions of its major foreign adversaries (read mass criminals that voluntarily positioned themselves that way) as good faith... I don't think they have the luxury of doing that.
The leaders are in power to do what's most beneficial for their population (domestic hyper-development) while avoiding an outcome that rhymes with 'century of opium'...serving western interests is a very low priority, as it should be.
This is the century of 'Don't trust, only verify' and I too feel the employed cautious approach is a requirement.