Martin Jacques on China’s military parade

CGTN Europe

Martin Jacques, Author of "When China Rules the World" spoke to CGTN Europe and discussed what role do the events like the military parade play in helping societies remember the past.

Transcript

00:00Martin Jakes is a distinguished academic, journalist, political commentator and the author of When China Rules the World.

00:07Martin, what role do events like this play in helping societies remember our past?

00:14Well, I think they're extraordinarily important, especially in the Chinese case because they lost between 15 and 20 million people.

00:23They were on their own in the struggle against the Japanese.

00:27And so it was a huge moment in their history.

00:32And to celebrate it in these new circumstances where China has completely transformed, it must be a thrilling moment for the population.

00:42Many other countries, of course, have held Second World War commemorative events in the United States and Europe and the UK.

00:49Are we remembering what happened in this war or are we forgetting the lessons?

00:58Well, it depends partly on which country you're talking from.

01:01Well, I think that we are, I mean, take the UK, we are remembering, we have remembered the victory in Europe.

01:13We've remembered a bit the victory with regard to Japan.

01:20And I think that we are extremely ignorant about China's role in the last war.

01:28I think most people wouldn't really be able to say, even know about it because it's been defined as separate from the Second World War,

01:37even though really it was part of that period between 1931 and 1945.

01:42And why don't we know about it in the West?

01:45Is it the fault of historians, authors, journalists, reporters or politicians or what?

01:51Well, here are two factors.

01:53One is that they were very separate geographies in the sense that China's war was way,

02:03long, long, long, long away from the European theatre, which occupied the United States, but not wholly, and also Europe.

02:15I think the second reason is that we basically devalue what happens in far away.

02:29And in the case of China, which has been such an unknown quantity for so long, that we just don't feel engaged with it.

02:37We don't know about it.

02:38We don't learn about it.

02:39And this has been very characteristic of this celebration now.

02:46People are beginning to get to know a bit more about it, but it's really from more or less ground zero, I think.

02:53How can commemorations like this foster mutual trust rather than misunderstanding?

03:01Well, I think that's a complex question.

03:03I think that this comes at a, I think it's not just an extraordinary celebration, but it comes at an extraordinary moment in global history

03:14with what is happening in the United States with Trump and what is happening in China

03:20and the conference before, just before this celebration, the SCO conference.

03:29And you have these two things being played out.

03:33That one is America first and the other is drawing countries together.

03:38And in a way that is quite an eloquent expression of the historical moment we're living in.

03:46As we mark this 80th anniversary of the end of the war,

03:51I wonder what you see as the most important lessons that we should draw from it.

03:56Well, one thing that we need to remind ourselves is war is a terrible thing.

04:05And the number of people that died in the Second World War,

04:11and I include in that the China's war with Japan,

04:17they're just a waste of humanity.

04:18The second thing I draw from it is that, you know, since then, there hasn't been another one.

04:27And there are dangers in the present situation.

04:33But the fact that we commemorate these conflicts

04:39is a reminder of what we don't want to happen and shouldn't happen again.

04:46What do you think are the most effective ways the international community can address

04:54on the deeper drivers of this conflict?

04:58What are the tools?

04:59How do you effectively stop this happening again?

05:03The institutions that were set up in the aftermath of the Second World War

05:07seem to be crumbling.

05:09They seem to be under fire.

05:11Well, I think we're living in a very unusual period

05:18where we've got, I would say, a breakdown of the post-war order.

05:27It's still in place, but it's clearly in big difficulties.

05:35America isn't any longer prepared to play the role it has.

05:39And that has been the cornerstone of the international system.

05:44So, and on the other hand, you've got what's been happening around China

05:50and the global south and so on,

05:54which is the birth of the beginnings of a new order.

05:59And this is a very complex situation.

06:01Martin, thank you very much.

06:02Martin Jakes, the academic, journalist and political commentator.

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