The Thousand Talents Plan is a transparent attempt by the CCP to accumulate economic and military power. It isn't bad because "China," it's bad because it increases the power of an authoritarian, imperial-minded, genocidal government.
The idea that this is to "increase the power of the CCP" is only true in sense that economic growth may increase the ruling party's popularity. In classic dictatorship thinking sending your best students abroad and accepting foreign educators is the last thing you would want to do.
That's why you consistently see Chinese born, US citizens with decades of time in the states prosecuted for espionage.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Chinese_spy_cases_in_t...
I agree. It doesn't contradict what I said, though. Both are true.
> only true in sense that economic growth may increase the ruling party's popularity
No. It also gives them better weapons, AI, surveillance technology, etc. It literally increases their power, both abroad and within their borders.
CCP's popularity is guaranteed because it is criminal in China to tell negative truths about them. Their popularity is irrelevant because they have control over the entire country's military and surveillance networks. If they can intern and slaughter millions of Uyghurs, it's almost impossible for a rebellion to overthrow them.
They don't need this program for popularity.
Not trying to use a "what-about-it" argument; I'm worried about China, but in terms of imperialism I'm much more worried about the USA, so I'm not sure if I prefer China stealing IP or the USA keeping that IP.
(An an aside, and mostly because I'm curious: are you from the USA? I feel like many people in the USA don't realize that in most countries the USA foreign policy isn't seen as something more virtuous than China...on the contrary, it's usually seen as worse. The USA's internal policy (human rights, democracy) is seen as better though)
> in terms of imperialism I'm much more worried about the USA
The US hasn't added/conquered territory since 1947, and it hasn't acquired a large, populated territory since 1898[1]. Whatever you want to call US foreign policy (certainly disastrous in the 20th century and early 21st), it's not imperial in the traditional sense of conquest and annexation.
> How many countries has China invaded in the last 20-30-40 years? How many has the USA?
The US hasn't unilaterally invaded any country since Panama in 1989[2]. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are horrific human rights disasters and unforgivable crimes, but they were not what I would call imperial. You may disagree.
China is in the process of taking over Hong Kong, and they already occupy Tibet, parts of Nepal, and parts of India[3]. They have shown aggression on many disputed borders in the last few years, and they have increased their naval presence in many parts of the world.
We should expect to see Taiwan annexed in the future, per Xi himself, although it's hard to know when or how they'll do it[4].
> in most countries the USA foreign policy isn't seen as something more virtuous than China...on the contrary, it's usually seen as worse. The USA's internal policy (human rights, democracy) is seen as better though
I am from the US and I do realize this. US foreign policy is certainly worse and more deadly than China's, but (as I've said in other comments) the US is not actively taking over new territory.
The two main differences are:
- US foreign policy trajectory is toward fewer wars, partly because we are a democracy and citizens are extremely against starting new wars now; Chinese policy is in the direction of aggression
- the US is not a dictatorship capable of ethnic genocide (at least in the modern era)
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_territorial_acqu...
2. https://www.thoughtco.com/american-involvement-wars-colonial...
3. https://theprint.in/theprint-essential/not-just-india-tibet-...
4. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/11/china-taiwan-inv...
You’re literally repeating the “China bad” argument
I’m not going to argue that the CCP is benign. But either the thousand talents program is specifically harmful in some way, or you’re against it because “China bad”. And you appear to be arguing the latter.
My opinion of thousand talents is it’s an attempt to reverse brain drain. I personally know a Chinese immigrant with a green card who was struggling to find funding for some kind of cancer research here in the states, then found funding working as a regional thousand talents back in China and now runs some lab or startup or something in Anhui.
Of course, hiding funding and income is another matter altogether.
Reasons A, B, and C can (and should) acknowledge the beneficiary of the thing that is being done.
If the beneficiary is power-hungry and genocidal, that is a valid reason for "thing" to be a bad idea.
Similarly, it's better for, let's say, Norway to become a nuclear power than for North Korea to become a nuclear power.
The accumulation of military power by a non-aggressive democracy is less dangerous than by an authoritarian regime that has shown recent interest in conquest.
The CCP is not China. China is not the CCP. China is not bad and Chinese people are not bad.
The CCP is, unequivocally, one of the most evil and dangerous organizations in the history of humankind. With enough technology, it will be literally impossible to organize a rebellion against them and return China to something like democracy. It will be like `1984` (and is not far off from that type of dystopia even today).
With enough military power, they can annex more and more countries, and no one will be able to stop them. Hong Kong and Taiwan are templates for the future.
> But either the thousand talents program is specifically harmful in some way, or you’re against it because “China bad”. And you appear to be arguing the latter.
I was very clear why I was against it. It's explicitly a program to exfiltrate scientific knowledge (which translates into military, surveillance, and economic power) from non-authoritarian countries to an authoritarian one.
The US has its share of horrific history, and I wish it weren't so powerful and dangerous, but I am always opposed to power flowing from a democratic country to an authoritarian one.
> My opinion of thousand talents is it’s an attempt to reverse brain drain. I personally know a Chinese immigrant with a green card who was struggling to find funding for some kind of cancer research here in the states, then found funding working as a regional thousand talents back in China and now runs some lab or startup or something in Anhui.
I'm not going to argue that nothing good comes of this program. The problem with regimes like the CCP is that they abuse well-intentioned people, and they use a façade of "for the people" to do things that are purely for themselves.
The "they can annex more and more countries" is pure speculation (besides the obvious case of Taiwan). Do you think they'll annex Thailand? Vietnam? Russia? Japan?
>The US has its share of horrific history, and I wish it weren't so powerful and dangerous, but I am always opposed to power flowing from a democratic country to an authoritarian one.
I agree that the CCP is dangerous, but the foreign invasion is a really poor argument, both because there's no evidence that China will invade other countries (again, besides the obvious Taiwan case) and because the USA has invaded multiple countries in the past 50 years...with horrific consequences to the population