I am from latin america and at least neither China nor Russia have participated in coup d'etat to install a military junta to then torture and massacre anyone slightly left of the US "Democratic" Party.
Which is fairly tame in terms of securing geopolitical influence and enables more win-win arrangments. Especially with respect to Laos - a landlocked country with (to be blunt) zero long term development prospects. Laos per capital GDP growth has been on pace with booming Vietnam that has access to outsource manufacturing and maritime trade. Laos should be worse off than Cambodia that has 60% of current Laos per capita GDP. Even their largest export/growth sector - hydropower to Thailand is enabled by PRC (not to sound patronizing). PRC infra projects setup Laos to be the battery of region + rail connectivity for other exports = only real viable of short/medium term growth strategy for a undeveloped landlocked country with poor human development. Go look up gdp per capita trends of ASEAN since 2000 when PRC growth started blowing up, also LATM during same period. You'll be hard pressed to find any country whose per capita GDP increased by 8x like Laos. Many are luck with half that. As for societal changes on border regions that benefits from flow of migrant and economic development, that's what happens when countries get richer - things change. If you think that's a bad deal then I'm curious if you can find a better one, especially for a land locked country with no maritime access.
It is easy to look everything through the lens of GDP but it is a poor measure of healthiness of a society from sociological perspective.
> Just repeating "landlocked country" twenty times doesn't paint the clearest picture. ... >untapped mineral resource
Being landlocked is one of the major development traps, it's highly relevant. And the point is Laos is landlocked AND underdevelopped in both infra and human capita. They're not going to be Switzerland without generations of development, if ever. All those untapped resources can't be economically exported relative to sea trade... incidentally why PRC rail development in Laos also game changer. Improves economics of rare metals (gold, Laos other huge export) but less for bulk cargo like agriculture. Laos has zero prospect for being an ag-commodity export power. The most profitable specialty ag trade had export potential of something like 600M. There's simply a ceiling on how much ag can uplift, it's why largest growth sector in last 20 years is industry, which requires capital investments, for a poor country like Laos, it means FDI and period of upheaval caused by new wealth and modes of exploitation.
> never knew how to handle that
Yeah that's what happens to nouvel rich everywhere. That's a sign of development. Laos is not usefully connected to English sphere via geography... again they're landlocked and only large economic connector is PRC. If people want to make money therer it's only prudent to learn Chinese and which will increase integration, especially in border regions. Why would Laos look to rest of world when the fastest growing region is Asia? Learning English is one way street to being brain drained and losing your best.
> GDP but it is a poor measure of healthiness of a society
This is true, ergo why Xi prioritized correcting the excesses of Deng's unbalanced growth that had caused huge problematic culture shifts. Every country that's gone through rapid growth will need manage that transition. Per capita GDP is strongly correlated to Human Development Index for a reason, you need money to make a healthy, educated, productive society. At end of day Laos/PRC relationship enables Laos to have more omney than her geography would otherwise enable. It's not upper income but it's a path out of subsistence if managed properly by Vientiane, which they may absolutely fail at.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Guevara#/media/File:CheinM...
More so: Russian Federation != Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93Venezuela_relati...
What was once a beautiful nation is now rife with crime, even the military of all things is told not to have cell phones out by stop lights because somebody will swing on by on a motorcycle and hijack the phone. From the darn military! Still surprised they get away with it.
I also remember hearing from a relative that Chavez would basically bring Cuban doctors over from Cuba.
"The only possible way to understand is by standing back in the stillness that lies underneath thinking and sees things as they really are. It's like watching hundreds of colors, each of them trying to persuade you it happens to be the most important one-then stepping back and seeing they all form a single rainbow. Thoughts in themselves are always leading to division and separation. But all thoughts, together, are a single whole." (from "Reality")
I'm not sure Imperial Japanese rule would be so much better, though.
China has supported violent Juntas in Myanmar, and Sudan. It has essentially performed a coup in Hong Kong. And of course it loves supplying weapons to latin countries via Norinco. And it's doing economic damage and putting more of those countries in debt, just like it took Hambantota International Port from Sri Lanka.
Both are racking up kills elsewhere in Africa too.
Links please? Saying nothing / neutral Verbal approval Material support All these can be interpreted as supporting military Juntas.
And military Juntas are not necessarily bad. For example, SK was developed effectively through a Military Junta government. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Republic_of_Korea
> It has essentially performed a coup in Hong Kong.
What is this? HK is part of China right?
> it loves supplying weapons to latin countries via Norinco.
Nothing special, China's aim is the largest weapon exporter.
> And it's doing economic damage and putting more of those countries in debt, just like it took Hambantota International Port from Sri Lanka.
This is shown to be a myth, as some other comments here suggested.
> Both are racking up kills elsewhere in Africa too.
What is this?
There have certainly been a bunch of opinion pieces expressing that opinion coming out at the same time. Which is incredibly weird, unless... oh right, opinions can be bought and China has a history of doing that.
Mystery solved I guess.
The case is that western media is so fixitated on negative coverage on China, so much so that any positive or neutral coverage will be seen as carefully manipulated campaign.
Every thread of China topic, here on HN, will see your type of comments consistently.
The real mystery is not that there is positive or neutral report on China.
The real mystery is why US people seem cannot use their brain on China topics...
Chinese media is state controlled, and no alternative is possible. If they wanted credible positive reporting, then they have only themselves to blame.
> There have certainly been a bunch of opinion pieces expressing that opinion coming out at the same time.
I was talking about English media. That's a reasonable assumption, since you are commenting on the HN comments, which is part of English media, and heavily influenced by mainstream English media, obviously.
You are an american or not is not relevant.
> If they wanted credible positive reporting, then they have only themselves to blame.
Wow.
Let's jail the SoB based on media reports. This is what you suggest, right?
Edit: profile I am replying to has the following in their about section: "about: I play music and I code videogames. I live in Brighton, UK." so assuming the "hi from venezuela" was sarcastic.
Has there ever been a lasting trade embargo that was based solely on moral and ethical grounds?