The Asia-Pacific strategy: revelation from movies

Pacific Rim is a 2014 fiction movie starring Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Robert Kazinsky, Max Martini, and Ron Perlman. The background of this movie set in the 2020s, there is a lot of monsters “kaijiu” emerged from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. For winning the war of battling with the monsters, people create the Jaegers, the gigantic robot controlled by at least two pilots and their minds are connected with each other by the technology. This movie’s photography began on 2011 and finished in 2012, including 3-D and IMAX 3D. This movie received a lot of positive reviews,especially in China. It earned 411 million totally.

In the movie, we can see many elements of Japan, for example, the commander of the Earth Defense Force talked with the G7, Japan is in the seven countries. On the other hand, the female lead is a Japanese,who is the assistance of the chief commander. Also, the name of the monster is kaijiu, which is a Japanese word. Importantly, the countries which has their own gigantic robot are Australia, Japan, America, Russia and China.

Warner Bros. Pictures

Nowadays, in the global politics, the Asia-Pacific is becoming more and more important. China, Japan and Australia is important in the situation of the Asia-Pacific. In the whole movie, Japan is a good helper of America, China, Russian Australian are the supporting roles.

We can find the similar political elements in a lot of movies, taking the popular movie”Gozilla 2014”as an example, the Japanese scientist consultant of United States Navy is an important role in the movie.

On Tuesday, Japan said that it would hold a bilateral military exercise in November with United States for improving the island defense capabilities.With the political issues happening about the dispute over the islands, the Japanese Self-Defense Force is becoming more close with the US Force than before.

For more information,
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/japan-america-forging-global-alliance-11539

Russia, the another important role in the Asia-Pacific strategy, has a subtle relationship with Japan, In previous 6 months, Japanese fighter jets often countered Russian Air Force. In Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s eyes, meeting the challenge from China is more important. Thus, Shinzo Abe eases the diplomatic tensions. However, the cooperation between Russia and China has became Shinzo Abe's concern.

Different with Russia, in the important roles of Asia-Pacific strategy, Australia has a stronger alliance with Japan. Japan helps Australia to build submarines. In July, we can see the violation of the Japan's arms export ban, the transfer of defence equipment and technology agreement was signed by Shinzo Abe and the Prime Minister of Australia Tony Abbott.

For China, the evidence of the pacific ambition of Japan was mainly about the dispute of the island called Diaoyu Island by China and Senkaku Island by Japan. In fact, this issue was put on table in 2012. The United States always stand on the Japan’s side. “US-Japan Alliance is the foundation for not only our security in Asia-Pacific region but also for the region as a whole and we have continued to strengthen, we are looking for the whole range of issues that are challenging at this time.” said the US president Obama. Yet, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said:” what I need to point out is that the so-called US-Japan alliance is a bilateral arrangement from the Cold War.”

Coming to the movie” Pacific Rim”, Jie Fang Daily, one of the biggest the major newspaper in China, has an article said that the movie try to support the concept of Asia-Pacific strategy of US. Yet, some critics said that the movie is just describing the reality, the US-Japan alliance is true and there is no reason why the movie cannot express that.

No matter what the pubic opinion is, the cooperation between Japan and US has a long history. After the World War II, Japan was occupied by the Allied Powers and then Japan became an independent country again and the formation of the alliance was happened in 1952. Japan started to be an important ally of the United States.

 

The Occupy Central Movement in Hong Kong

On October 6th, the protesters in Hong Kong are still not leaving. Most protesters are in the Causeway Bay and Mongkok. A big group of protesters are sitting under the sculpture outside the government complex symbolized Hong Kong’s’umbrella revolution’. The good news is that Hong Kong government claimed that they will have formal talk with the protesters.The people who are occupying central knows clearly that it is vital to have a more open system which means the resignation of Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying.

But, people who are occupying central want to talk with the leader Leung chun-ying but not the city’s second-highest ranking official, Chief Secretary Carrie Lam. Apple daily, one of the largest newspapers in Hong Kong, said that if you don’t know what is in the Chief Executive’s mind, just look at his fake smile. The movement is bigger than in July.



pro-government supporters scream at pro-democracy protesters in Mongkok
Chris McGrath/Getty Images

In fact, though it has the huge influence in the world, it became chaotic. In Mongkok, an area in Kowloon, some alcoholics in the demonstrators attacked the police and that made more policemen come with batons. More innocent demonstrators were attacked by police. Besides, some Local residents, pro-government supporters and anti-protest activists had conflicts with the pro-democracy protesters. What makes Hong Kong be in this situation now? What factors influenced this event?

My friend in Hong Kong,Wai Chan,posted this poster on Wechat.He said,we Hong Kong people have waited for a long time,we won't give up.

“Occupy central with love and peace” is a slogan and a nonviolent direct action movement. Pro-democracy Protesters demands a fully democratic government in Hong Kong. The protesters want to have negotiations with the government. China’s decision made the protests feel sad and angry that committees will decide the candidates for chief executive in the 2017.




Hong Kong
An unofficial referendum hold by pro-democracy activists in University of Hong Kong. Tai Yiu-ting, an activist and professor ,said that this is a historical time for Hong Kong, this unofficial referendum showed people in Hong Kong want democracy. Joshua Wong,age 17,a student activist, said that Students think that the central government’s actions will lead to increased conflict and fuel people’s anger. When the average student thinks of how to study or plan their career for the future, student activist group think about what Hong Kong’s future should be like.

Mainland China
The pro-Beijing activists claimed that it is silly to do this referendum. The police force used tear gas on September 28th . A lot of protesters said that they feel very disappointed that the police force use violence Some pointed Comments in the People’s Daily, the major newspaper in China, said that no matter how the activists stir up people to rebellion, these movements is illegal.

UK, USA
British Prime Minister David Cameron said: I deeply concern about what is happening. I think what matters is the basic agreement that we set out with the Chinese all those years ago.

The spokesperson for the United States Department of State said that the United States supports the universal suffrage of Hong Kong, according to the basic law and the aspirations of Hong Kong people. According to the New York Times, Obama hopes China solve this problem as soon as possible so that it won’t influence the visit to Beijing in November.

What is worth noticing is that the British gave people in Hong Kong laws, freedom but no democracy. A famous politics writer in Taiwan, Li Ao, said that if you want to change the governments by demonstration or movement, any governments in the world will use violence to prevent people from destroying them. It is silly to express the anger of governments by a direct way. Hundreds of years ago, people could do that because the weapons army had were not very different with the citizens had. However, nowadays, a normal person cannot combat with tanks and planes. Freedom was not lost after the British left, laws was not lost after the British left, now it is ridiculous that citizens in Hong Kong ask the democracy from the communist party. It is known to all that Hong Kong is peaceful and safe, but politics in Taiwan is chaotic, you can call it “democracy” but without rules and peace. Hong Kong is not supposed to imitate Taiwan and then break the rules and laws.

1950-1960
People republic of China was founded in 1949.A lot of refugees in Mainland China escaped to Hong Kong.

1960-1990
The gap between the rich and the poor was huge in Hong Kong. Workers was not allowed to rest each week. Leftist group was founded and then the communist members asked a lot of workers to start an Anti-British revolution. However, the local residents disliked this revolution with violence, a lot of them supported the colonial government. Though leftists failed to take over Hong Kong, the British government started to pay attention to the livelihood of people in Hong Kong. People in Hong Kong became richer than before. Also, the economical take-off of Hong Kong started.

1990-now
The colonial government set Hong Kong on the road to democracy and China was angry with it. The “handover” of Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to China took place on 1 July 1997,before that, a lot of people in Hong Kong was afraid of the communist party. But, Chinese government promised that they would give Hong Kong democracy in the future. As the time went on, in 2003, Hong Kong people was angry with the Hong Kong government, especially the Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa, who was appointed by the Chinese government, there was a huge demonstration in Hong Kong. These kind of demonstrations was happened often in each year from 2003 till now. Furthermore, the Hong Kong-Mainland conflict became bigger, Hong Kong people disliked the Individual Visit Scheme because some tourists didn’t obey the law in Hong Kong. The Parallel trading in Hong Kong has even caused milk powder shortage.