History looms larger for those who lost. Chinese President Xi Jinping, who on Thursday meets Barack Obama, his US counterpart, in California, bears national expectations that have been stewing for more than a century-and-a-half of humiliation. At the same time, China’s sense of manifest destiny is even stronger than that of the US. It is certainly older, stretching back through a semi-mythical 5,000 years of unbroken Han history. A sense of boiling injustice mixed with certainty about one’s pre-eminent position in the global hierarchy makes for a potent brew. Yet contrary to the swagger with which China sometimes conducts itself on the international stage these days, in many ways Beijing has never felt more vulnerable.
Read Full Article »
