Chinese general disses U.S., predicts major military action South China Sea "most likely"

Inside China: ‘Fierce of mien but faint of heart’

By Miles Yu
The Washington Times

Wednesday, February 29, 2012


‘FIERCE OF MIEN BUT FAINT OF HEART’

The recently announced shift in the U.S. strategic emphasis toward the Asia-Pacific region represents a strategic bluff by a declining America against a rising China that will fail because China can defeat the U.S. militarily.

That’s the assessment of a leading spokesman for the People’s Liberation Army, as reported Tuesday in the state-run Chinese press.

Maj. Gen. Luo Yuan was quoted in a long interview first published in Guangzhou Daily and reprinted throughout China’s main media outlets, including Xinhua News Agency.

Gen. Luo is a prominent princeling whose father, Luo Qingchang, was Mao Zedong’s foreign intelligence and sabotage chief. He is one of the few high-ranking People’s Liberation Army officials allowed to make public statements on defense matters.

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It’s a wrong time, Gen. Luo elaborated, because the current ethos calls for peace and development, not war. It’s a wrong place because America’s homeland is still under grave danger, and Washington is still bogged down in the crisis-ridden Middle East. It’s a wrong adversary because, by choosing China as a presumed nemesis, the United States has chosen an enemy it cannot defeat.

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“Today’s America,” Gen. Luo said, “is no longer able to extend all of its 10 fingers. It must retreat and clench the 10 fingers into a fist. This is what the Chinese call ‘fierce of mien but faint of heart.’ “

After dissing the United States, Gen. Luo predicted that a major military action in the South China Sea is “most likely” to occur this year as China’s “restraint” and “tolerance” over the South China Sea territorial disputes with several “little countries” will run out soon.


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