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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 20-Apr-06
An eerie similarity: Chinese President Hu Jintao and Donald Rumsfeld

Web Log - April, 2006

An eerie similarity: Chinese President Hu Jintao and Donald Rumsfeld

Hu gives President Bush a copy of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" when they meet on Thursday.

Pundits are saying that Hu wants to help Bush learn how to fight the Iraq war, but it seems more likely to me that he's warning Bush about Taiwan.


Sun Tzu
Sun Tzu

The Art of War, written in the sixth century BC, is probably the most famous book on military strategies and tactics ever written. The silk edition given to Bush is a powerful message.

Taiwan is the number one issue on Hu's mind these days, because 60% of Chinese people believe that it's the #1 Sino-U.S. issue, and other polls have shown most Chinese believe that the U.S. and China will have a war over Taiwan.

The warning to Bush comes from a Chinese leader who is genial, well-liked, but enigmatic:

Now think about our own generational differences here in America. This description of Hu doesn't sound like someone from the G.I. generation, the decisive people that won World War II, nor from the Baby Boomer generation, the self-absorbed people that can't do anything but argue.


Hu Jintao
Hu Jintao

No, Hu Jintao sounds like someone from our Silent generation, the people who grew up during the Great Depression and World War II. William Strauss and Neil Howe, in their book Generations, describes people of the Silent generation as problem solvers. But, "their solutions -- fairness, openness, due process, expertise -- reflect a lack of surefootedness, but also a keen sense of how and why humans fall short of grand civic plans or ideal moral standards. Silent appeals for change have seldom arisen from power or fury, but rather through a self-conscious humanity and tender social conscience.... Lacking an independent voice, they have adopted the moral relativism of the skilled arbitrator, mediating arguments between others -- and reaching out to people of all cultures, races, ages, and handicaps." (Generations, p. 282)

Any generation that grows up during a crisis war is called an "Artist generation," because of their sensitivity to the needs of other people.

Hu Jintao is deeply embedded in China's last Artist generation. He was born in 1942, seven years before the end of China's last crisis war, the violent, genocidal civil war that began with Mao Zedong's "Long March" in 1934, and ended in 1949, after the deaths of tens of millions of Chinese, with the flight of Chiang Kai-shek and his defeated army to the island of Taiwan.

Conflict risk level for next 6-12 months as of: 9-Feb-2006
W. Europe 1 Arab Israeli 3
Russia Caucasus 2 Kashmir 2
China 2 North Korea 2
Financial 3 Bird flu 3
Key: 1=green 1=Low risk 2=yellow 2=Med 3=red 3=High 4=black 4=Active

In my conflict risk graphic, I've often considered increasing the risk level for China from 2 (medium risk) to 3 (high risk), but one of the factors holding me back was that China's President is from the Artist generation, and is very unlikely to make an actual decision to wage war preemptively.

These are the things that lead me to make a comparison between Hu and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld is also in an Artist generation -- America's Silent Generation. No matter what one may think of him, there's no doubt that Rumsfeld extremely genial, and always manages to maintain his sense of humor, even under the most hostile questioning by the Wasington press corps.

Rumsfeld is also a very unlikely person to initiate a war; he certainly didn't make the decision to invade Iraq.

But here's the point: Once the decision had been made by President Bush, Rumsfeld prosecuted the war with brutal energy. I still remember Rumsfeld at press conferences during the Afghan and Iraq wars, responding to a reporter's question with something like the following: "We aren't trying to be nice to these people; what we want is to kill them."

Rumsfeld can say that without flinching because he grew up at a time when there were only two choices: kill the Germans and the Japanese, or be killed by them. I always felt a great deal of sadness in Rumsfeld as I watched the press conferences, but a ruthlessness as well.

Similarly, Hu Jintao may never be the one who makes the decision to go to war over Taiwan, but he won't have to - the decision will be made by the Communist Party's Central Committee, by people who are in younger generations and quite willing to declare war. Once the decision is made, Hu will be like Rumsfeld -- he'll pursue the war energetically and ruthlessly.

So what I'm imagining about Hu Jintao as he meets Bush is that, as an Artist, he'll be reaching out with sadness, hoping to prevent a war over Taiwan. But he'll also be warning Bush that the war will be pursued ruthlessly.

How ruthlessly? Consider the following commentary in Lionel Giles' 1910 translation of The Art of War:

This anecdote should make it clear that any war with China will be far more savage than most people expect.

Unfortunately, Generational Dynamics predicts that such a war over Taiwan will occur with 100% certainty. It may begin this year or next year or after, but it's likely to occur sooner rather than later. (20-Apr-06) Permanent Link
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