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Saturday, February 26, 2022
Peace: An Unneglectable Hard Power
Kung Chan

Ukraine's peace effortshave just ended up in failure.

Many countries,including China, have demanded peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, andChinese President Xi Jinping has made a personal call to promote the matter. Asa result, there seemed to be a welcome change in the war situation. Russiaagreed to negotiate, put forward its own conditions, and sent a delegation.According to the Kremlin, Russian President Vladimir Putin had also ordered atemporary ceasefire on the front lines to facilitate negotiations. However,after repeated hesitations, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy agreed,refused, agreed and refused again, and finally decided to refuse the peacetalks because he could not accept Russia's terms. The latter's demands areclear, that Ukraine needs to "demilitarize", which means it will haveto give up its independence. Hence, after complicated iterations, Ukrainianpeace efforts have failed.

War breaks out whenpeaceful efforts break down.

Putin then ordered thatthe Russian army to hasten the attack. That is when we saw fierce battles in Kyivwhere the blasts lit up the night sky. Thus far, the Russian army, with itsabsolute superiority, has approached the area 5 kilometers away from theparliament building in the center of Kyiv. At the same time, Western countrieshave also abandoned various prior considerations and reached a consensus, whichmeans that they are willing to pay a significant cost for it. They are nowready to immediately cut off Russia's SWIFT system, and start large-scalemilitary assistance. For the first time, the NATO emergency armed forcescarried out full mobilization, and 40,000 troops began to deploy to theUkrainian border. The British army force has also been deployed to theUkrainian border for the first time after the war, and even the Portuguese armforce was sent there.

It appears that thesounds of war cries are now echoing throughout the world. What then, shouldChina do?

My answer is rather simple.China is already on the right track, where it is actively working to push forpeace in Ukraine, and it should continue to do so. The power brought about by warcan indeed cause irrationality in many cases, but peace is also anoften-forgotten hard power, and it is always the final victor.

So now China shouldcontinue to insist on achieving peace in Ukraine. It needs to believe that, nowand in the future, the forces that demand peace will definitely converge into amajor potency in the world, and China can completely become the its leader andemerge as its champion.

There is no perpetual warin this world, after all. Putin would want peace in the end, and so does Ukraine.Geopolitics has always emphasized on prediction, judgment and choice. To seethe future directions, and preset oneself on the side of the final winner inadvance would be the actual wise decision.

China has in fact alreadymade such a choice, and this is precisely the action taken by President XiJinping. What it needs to do in the future is to insist on such peaceful approach,and strive to become the leader of all peaceful forces. Ultimately, what Chinawants is peace.

To this end, I thinkwhen necessary, China should consider replacing the hawkish spokespersons of itsMinistry of Foreign Affairs to show its position. In today's world, only byinsisting on peace can China show its strength, because there is nothing morepowerful than the force that pushes for peace as hard power. With everyone elsefocusing on winning the war, it is more necessary for China to tell the world aviable alternative.

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