Chinese government denounces revisionism

There's something more than a little ironic about the latest row between China and Japan. China is making a big deal about the fact that some Japanese school textbooks seem to downplay Japan's atrocities during World War II.

This is hardly surprising. I think most countries' textbooks tend to downplay the more unsavory parts of national history. I know American school textbooks make a big deal about 'Manifest destiny' but not quite as much about its consequence: the genocide of the Native Americans. When I was in Guinea, their civics texts hardly mentioned the horrific repression of the First Republic (1958-84) except in the most vague terms. I wonder how much detail British and French textbooks go into the atrocities committed during colonialism in Africa or the ruthless Dutch campaign in Indonesia.

Even though the Japanese prime minister took the unprecedented step of apologizing for Japan's wartime crimes, China wasn't satisified. China wasn't mentioned specifically in the apology.

Of course, the textbook issue is merely a ruse for the Chinese to pick a fight. It makes people forget that Japan is a fairly prosperous democracy and China is an authoritarian state.

While there's more than a grain of truth in the complaint that Japan has barely done anything to face up to its atrocious crimes during World War II and before, I wonder how people in Tibet feel about China's denunciations of Japanese imperialism.

And it's quite amusing to hear the Chinese autocracy, of all countries, complaining about censorship and glossing over history. I wonder how many Chinese textbooks mention the Tianamen Square uprising and massacre. I wonder how many mention tens of millions who starved during Mao's Great Leap Forward [sic].

Then again, the row with the Japanese is surely one of the few news stories NOT censored by the regime.