TNAG-2717-FCO40-3923-House-of-Commons-Select-Committee-on-Foreign-Affairs-enquiry-1993 — Page 41

differences of opinion. The differences of opinion that must be there in China relate to the pace and direction of development of China, not that China should not try to become very modern and very outward looking and share in its place in the world, but the tensions arise over the speed and direction.

There are those who think that it is terribly dangerous to let everything rip, to let the sail go, let the sheets go, to get growth and economy, because that will lead to chaos. There are those like Deng Xiaoping himself who reckon that you have to go hard and fast to release the creative energy of

of the Chinese people and get a huge upsurge of economic activity which will bring the wealth which will trickle down to the rest who have not got it.

So a bit of disturbance, bit of inflation, is probably unavoidable.

There are these sorts of tensions, but I do not think anybody in China wants ever to go back to the bad old days. The cultural revolution left such a shock, the great leap forward left such a shock that no-one ever wants to go back to that, so I do not think you will see anything like Maoism again.

Question:

I wonder if I could ask one further question: How do you see China's main foreign policy and military objectives? What do you think are the priorities in those areas for China?

Sir Alan Donald: The current philosophy is very easy to state and this is their official line: they want a peaceful world, particularly on their borders. Because, with a peaceful world around them they can attend to the task of reforming China and it is a huge task that they have embarked on.

Beyond that, they would like to be dealt with respect fully by the rest of the world, with mutual respect, which makes them very twitchy about criticism from outside on what goes on inside China, although some of it may be very well deserved they are very nervous about it. They would like, at least, to have all the trappings of authority that the major countries in the world. have, like the United States, the European countries and Japan, which involves a decent defence force and ability to defend their

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