The current world is an era of great reflection, and the world is almost simultaneously reflecting, which is almost the first time in human history. It is necessary to worship authority, and at the same time, it is necessary to think independently to test whether this idea is correct or not, or to persist in seeking truth from facts, and practice is the only criterion for testing the truth of understanding. I think the study style of the Foreign Affairs College is very good, the source of students is very good, the response of various units is very good, the atmosphere is good, the teachers are good, and I hope that everyone will grow up healthily in such an atmosphere - China needs talents who understand the world too much, and it is too necessary to explain China's talents to the world.
Students, we must cherish every opportunity to communicate in public. Chinese many people who are not good at communication, and their speeches cannot impress people, so they cannot make people accept their views very well.
We Chinese must also understand, how did we fall behind for hundreds of years? My brother, a major general, went to the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Hall and said it was a disgrace to the Chinese soldiers. Why was China invaded? Why can't Chinese soldiers protect ordinary people? The point is that China is lagging behind. Why is Chinese behind the world?
The great changes in the world have been mainly for six hundred years. In 1492, Columbus discovered the New World, but it was earlier than Columbus, and from 1405 to 1433, Zheng He went to the West. I went to Singapore to see them doing an exhibition on the Belt and Road Initiative. As soon as I entered the exhibition hall, I was shocked, and I saw the bow of Zheng He's Western treasure ship at that time, which was particularly tall and magnificent. Zheng He's fleet to the West consisted of sixty or seventy ships, 28,000 seafarers, and was vast. Columbus discovered the New World, and he had only three ships with 87 men on board.
This contrast, let's feel it. At that time, China's shipbuilding technology was the most advanced in the world, which was very remarkable. China was open to the ming dynasty when Zhu Di was the ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, but later it was closed, and the sea was banned, and no one was allowed to go to the sea, and those who violated it were beheaded. Zheng He's fleet to the West was the most powerful fleet in the world, and it was not allowed to go to the sea, and the most powerful fleet was rotten in the sea. State-of-the-art shipbuilding technology was shelved. Zheng He's voyage to the West was the first opportunity in China's history to go global and achieve great development. This opportunity was lost by Chinese himself, and if we Chinese follow the path of Zheng He to the West, the history of the world will be rewritten. The history of humiliation of the Chinese nation over the past 100 years is unlikely to occur.
Will there be any chances later? Yes! Open opportunities, Kangqian prosperous, great emperor. Unlike the Emperors of the Han People, the manchu emperors, the peoples on horseback, who attached great importance to expanding their territory, increased the land area of China by 8.9 million square kilometers, and later lost 3 million, and also 5.9 million square kilometers. The Kangxi Emperor, great, a great emperor in Chinese history, was very concerned about the world, when foreign missionaries came to China, the Kangxi Emperor asked foreign missionaries to teach him modern scientific knowledge, he saw that European industry was up, very powerful, so the Kangxi Emperor introduced foreign guns when he suppressed the Dzungar rebellion, which played a great role.
Last year, I chatted with the director of the Palace Museum, and he said that during the Manchu Qing Dynasty, there were more than a hundred foreigners living in the Forbidden City, which was quite open. There is a comparison to identify. One compares the foreign emperors of the contemporaneous, Peter the Great of Russia. The Kangxi Emperor was born in 1654, and Peter the Great was born in 1672. They were all emperors when they were very young, Kangxi was emperor at the age of 8, and Peter the Great was emperor at the age of 10. The Kangxi Emperor saw that there were good things in Europe, invited them to give lectures, when Peter the Great reigned, there was a minister around him, one day he told Peter the Great that Europe had come ahead of us, it was better to go and see; Peter the Great took more than 200 people to Europe for a private visit, inspected for a year and a half, returned to Russia, implemented the policy of opening up, "go out, please come in", in his hands, Russia embarked on the road to rise. Peter the Great famously said, "Give me twenty years, and I'll give you a new Russia." President Putin also said: "Give me twenty years, and I will give you a strong Russia." "Peter the Great has done it, and it is difficult to say whether President Putin can do it."
Peter the Great seized the "open", which was a great emperor.
How Peter the Great died is also very interesting. In the late autumn of 1724, he inspected St. Petersburg and found that someone had fallen into the sea. Peter the Great jumped into the water to save people, and the people were rescued, but he suffered from wind and cold, fell ill, and died in early 1725. Such a thing probably can't happen in China. The emperor wanted to jump into the sea to save people, but he was already pulled by the eunuch. This is how Peter the Great was influenced by the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and valued human life. The power of thought is enormous.
At this time, if the Kangxi Emperor also visited abroad and opened up to the outside world, the subsequent history of humiliation would not happen.
How did China fall behind? Stagnant. Chinese there is no shortage of talent, but why are these opportunities lost? Strong inertia, two thousand years of inertia that only looks inside and not outside. The danger of inertial thinking is that when people do not ask why, habit becomes natural, which is very frightening. I was a spokesperson from January 1991 to 1994, and I followed up on foreign visits. Chairman Jiang liked to communicate with others, and once he asked, "Chairman Mao is great, and Deng Xiaoping is also great." Why didn't Chairman Mao propose reform and opening up, but Deng Xiaoping proposed reform and opening up?" I said that the experiences of the two were different, and Chairman Mao went abroad twice in his life, both to the Soviet Union. Chairman Mao has never been to the Western world.
Deng Xiaoping went to France in October 1920 at the age of 16. He left France for the Soviet Union in January 1926 at the age of 21. The age of 16 to 21 is an important stage in life. Deng Xiaoping was from Sichuan to France, and the contrast was too stark. A person's courage, ability, and his experience have a lot to do with it. Seeing or not seeing it makes a big difference. Chinese go out today, good thing! Why is it different to have seen the world and not seen the world? This is because dialogue among civilizations is the source of progress for human civilization. Deng Xiaoping had the experience of going to France and proposed reform and opening up, which was the result of the dialogue between civilizations.
Today's China must eliminate the inertia of closure. Some people speak with great enthusiasm, saying that in the more than thirty years of reform and opening up, a large amount of money has been taken away by foreigners, and Chinese earned is hard-earned money. These words sound reasonable, according to the idea of these words to think deeper, reform and opening up is right or wrong? According to the logic of these people, it is best for China to return to closure. Back to the closed state, isn't that the end? China's development can only come step by step, can you jump to the high-end at once? No way. The big idea of opening up will be violated, then it will not work, and China will be unlucky. We must be vigilant against closed thinking, and long-term closed inertial thinking consciously or unconsciously affects people's behavior.
In modern times, whenever we have a correct understanding of the world, our domestic policy is also relatively correct, and our cause will make great strides; whenever we misread the world, our domestic policy will also have problems, and we will be very unlucky.
In 1946, there was much debate in China, and chairman Mao wrote a one-and-a-half-page document in April: a few estimates of the current international situation. First, the world war will be postponed; second, sooner or later there will be a compromise between the United States and the Soviet Union; third, relations with capitalist reactionaries will be eliminated first if they can be eliminated, and then destroyed after what cannot be eliminated. These understandings are correct, so China has made great strides forward.
The communiqué of the Sixth Plenary Session of the Eighth Central Committee of the Central Committee in 1958 pointed out: "The general characteristic of the current international situation is that the enemy is getting worse day by day, and we are getting better day by day." After graduating from university in 1959, I was hired by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and worked abroad for 25 years. Totally wrong, totally upside down. The domestic policy is also wrong, the big moon is advancing, the super Britain catches up with the United States... A lot of the data has now been declassified, and by June 1958, Chairman Mao's mind was even hotter, saying, catching up with Britain, there are almost three years, catching up with the United States, ten years can be, there is a full grasp. 70 million people went up to the mountains to make steel, crazy, I have also participated in steelmaking, has Yaqing participated? Oh, and participated. At that time, I was also the furnace director. After practicing, I was very happy, I didn't want money to eat supper at night, and I let go of my belly to eat, but the good times were not long. In 1959, 1960, 1961, there was famine, how many people died. According to national statistics, before this, there was an annual increase of 10 million, and in recent years, not only has there been no growth, but it has also decreased by more than 10 million. The world is wrong, the domestic policy is wrong, and the Chinese is very unlucky.
Twenty years later, in October 1978, Deng Xiaoping visited Japan, which was a very important diplomatic move - Sino-Japanese relations must be done well. Deng Xiaoping went to Nissan to compare the labor productivity of Changchun Automobile Factory, the most advanced automobile factory in China, and found that Nissan was dozens of times that of Changchun. So Deng Xiaoping sighed, I now understand what modernization is, and I came back to the Third Plenum. What do these three examples illustrate? To understand the world accurately. This one is too important.
The second question is the great changes in the world.
I went to a lot of universities and asked them what the biggest change in the world is right now, some people said globalization, some people said information revolution, some people said the rise of the BRICS countries. I'm not right, what do you think? Yes, the theme of the times has changed, and peace and development are the themes of the present era.
The change in the theme of the times is the biggest change in international relations. (From "war and revolution" to "peace and development")
I had a debate with General Luo Yuan, Phoenix TV, and he was very angry, "When you say you should shoot, you will shoot." I interrupted him and said are you going to fight, and he didn't dare answer. I said you made the mistake of the times.
What is the theme of the times? First, it reflects the main contradictions of the world in a certain period. Second, it points out the path to resolving the main contradictions.
Now many people still have the inertial thinking of war and revolution, always thinking of fighting a war -- the United States can't fight, the Philippines can fight? Totally mistaken times.
On the eve of the tenth anniversary of 9/11 in 2011, a reporter from the Washington Post interviewed me. His first words said that China was the biggest beneficiary of 9/11, and I said that was not right. Some people say that the Ukraine crisis ushered in a ten-year period of development opportunities for China - this is not true, why do you always think that others are unlucky? If others are unlucky and you are lucky, then are others unlucky? When foreigners look at it, why are you always schadenfreude in China? These so-called "strategists" are untenable and have not grasped the big context of the theme of the times. The Global Times often publishes very extreme articles, and last year Hu Xijin invited me to the Global Times forum, and there was an opening statement, and he came up and talked about the world as a mess. I said that there is no overall situation in your eyes, you can't see the general trend of the world, you can't grasp the mainstream. I said in my heart that this is today's China, he is the editor-in-chief of the newspaper, very knowledgeable, but he does not grasp the overall situation. Is the world progressing or regressing? I see the world improving. Some people are easily pessimistic that war is imminent. Of course, we must have a strong national defense, and it is one thing for all the armies of the world to be prepared to fight. But how we objectively and correctly assess the situation is another matter.
The theme of the times has changed, and there are many reasons for this. The bitter lessons of the two world wars are very important, and later everyone thought bitterly about the establishment of the United Nations, the Charter of the United Nations is very important, and we should pay attention to the role of the United Nations. Why is it that this is no longer the age of revolution? The era of revolution has passed, and the "color revolution" has not succeeded, soRos himself said. Of course, we must see that in this world, the gap between rich and poor is too large, and there are too many poor people, so only development can solve problems, and development is the theme.
What is China's diplomatic strategy? Three no's: no expansion, no hegemony, no alliance; Third, we must be peaceful, we must develop, and we must cooperate.
China cannot go to the alliance, as soon as the alliance begins, the new Cold War will begin, China will be unlucky, and the world will be unlucky.
China faces many problems that can only be solved by development. What is Chinese's greatest interest at this stage? Now that this problem is clearly thought out, other issues will be easier to handle. I think, as Deng said, development is the last word, and the greatest interest is to maintain the momentum of development. When you read Sun Tzu's Art of War, there is a "momentum chapter", and when the momentum comes, it will be easy to handle. "When the heavens and the earth are all working together, the heroes are not free."
The military is often soft on diplomacy, and before I went to the National Defense University to give a lecture, they just asked about diplomacy. I said that China's development in the past three decades is inseparable from the correct policy of the central authorities. Soft and hard are all means, which is difficult? Soft and difficult. Hard, you hit me and I kick you, and this three-year-old will too, no difficulty. Reasoning, negotiation, soft power, this is hard – first of all, people have to like you. What you say is disgusted by others, where is the soft power of this?
If you want to think through, Chinese what you want, can't think through, can't catch the bull's nose, the problem can't be solved. China's current momentum, the first time since the Opium War, this momentum has been lost, and if we want to find it again, you young people may not be able to find it back at my age. Although China's strength has risen, it will take at least thirty or fifty years to fully develop. Remember, remember, don't be "arrogant".
To accurately understand the importance of the world, the great changes in the world, and China's diplomacy, I will talk about these three points today. ”
— Wu Jianmin, former Chinese ambassador to France and former dean of the China Foreign Affairs University, passed away on June 18, 2016. This article is selected from Wu Jianmin's speech at the China Foreign Affairs University on March 30, 2016, entitled: Accurate understanding of today's world.
Source丨 relevant knowledge of the party
Editor 丨 and Jinyi
Responsible editor 丨 Huang Zengfu
Review 丨 Zhang Shubiao
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