Based on Yoshiko Sakurai’s Shukan Shincho column “Renaissance,” this article examines the Chinese sense of chosen-people superiority, national myth, and the trauma born from defeat by Japan. It explores the psychological driving force behind the Chinese Communist regime, which, even after spreading the Wuhan virus, shows no remorse and seeks to lead the next world order.

2020-06-19
Indeed, the trauma of the Chinese people was born from having been defeated in battle by the Japanese, whom they had regarded as inferior to themselves.
Yoshiko Sakurai is a national treasure as defined by Saicho.
Indeed, she is the supreme treasure.
Yoshiko Sakurai’s regular column “Renaissance,” together with Masayuki Takayama’s column, closes Shukan Shincho every week.
The essay she has published in this week’s issue under the title “Never Forget National Humiliation—China’s Dark Driving Force” is an essay that not only every Japanese citizen, but people all over the world, must read.
Despite having spread the Wuhan virus throughout the world and already taken 430,000 lives, neither the Chinese government nor the Chinese people show any sign of reflection.
On the contrary, they now claim that it is none other than China that will build the next world order and lead the world.
Where does this attitude, which can only be called arrogant, come from?
That question must be held not only by Japan, but by many people in many countries.
The book by Wang Zheng, How China’s Historical Consciousness Was Made, translated by Makoto Ito and published by Toyo Keizai Inc., answers such questions.
Wang emphasizes that the Chinese believe that the most superior people in this world are the Chinese people.
It is well known that since ancient times, China has called the peoples around it Dongyi, Xirong, Nanman, and Beidi, and has regarded them as barbarians.
The Chinese people have prided themselves on possessing a superior culture and civilization, and on governing the country through its virtue, while looking down on those around them.
In that sense, it is fair to say that China is a society with a strong element of racial discrimination.
At the same time, however, if “barbarians” followed the teachings of China, were dyed in Chinese civilization, and became Chinese, China accepted them.
In that respect, the Chinese themselves believe that the Chinese people are generous.
Wang says that in order to understand the psychology of the Chinese people, one must know the three elements that support their pride and patriotism.
They are: ① a chosen-people consciousness, ② myth, and ③ trauma.
The first goes back to ancient times.
Ancient Chinese believed that they were the chosen people living in the sacred land at the center of the world.
As Chinese philosophy, customs, writing, and the like spread to neighboring countries and formed “a kind of master-disciple relationship” with them, the Chinese came to be strongly convinced of the universality and superiority of Chinese civilization, and their chosen-people consciousness took deep root.
The Chinese complex
The story of a chosen people became the second element, myth, and this too took root in the hearts of the Chinese people.
But what shattered it was the century of “humiliation” after the Opium War.
That is the third element, trauma.
The century of humiliation consists of the following six wars.
① The First Opium War, 1840–42,
② The Second Opium War, 1856–60,
③ The Sino-Japanese War, 1894–95,
④ The Boxer Rebellion, 1900,
⑤ The Manchurian Incident, 1931,
⑥ The Second Sino-Japanese War, 1937–45.
What we Japanese should note here is that Japan was involved in as many as four of those six wars.
In both the Sino-Japanese War and the Boxer Rebellion, China was miserably defeated.
Japan won completely.
The Chinese side won the Second Sino-Japanese War, but that was only the result of Japan having been defeated by the United States.
Wang explains that their pride is wounded even by that fact.
On the obi of Wang’s book are the words, “Why are the Japanese so hated?”
In Chapter 3, it is introduced that Chiang Kai-shek repeatedly wrote in his diary, “I shall record measures to destroy the Wa, the Japanese, and wash away national humiliation.”
Indeed, the trauma of the Chinese people was born from having been defeated in battle by the Japanese, whom they had regarded as inferior to themselves.
Therefore, it is correct to understand that Japan and the Japanese are hated in a special way.
Their hatred is also turned on and off like a faucet according to the political circumstances of the moment, and it can attack us whenever necessary.
Wang emphasizes that without knowing the chosen-people consciousness stuck deep within Chinese society, the myth of China’s greatness, the psychology born from the trauma of having that myth shattered, and the Chinese complex, it is impossible truly to understand the behavior of today’s Chinese people or the world strategy of the Chinese Communist Party regime.
This essay continues.