Noam Chomsky Interview - China (Continued)

Noam Chomsky: Remember that China has a big demographic problem. The big Chinese growth period last 20-30 years has been helped enormously by the fact that there was a boom in young workers. This big boom of people 20-30 years old is declining because of one child policy. So China is moving towards a decline in human component that created this growth. China is a significant power that wants to have a role in the world. And it is a military threat as well. Countries in Southeast Asia, particularly Vietnam, have been frightened by China for a thousand years. It is something that the United States never understood. Actually, I visited Hanoi in 1970 when there was a bombing pause and they invited me to lecture right in the middle of the war. As soon as I got there, the first thing they told me to do was to go to a war museum. And in that museum you spend 3 very boring hours watching re-enactment of every battle with the Chinese starting since 12th century. So what they tell you is simple. They don’t care about the Americans because we are across the Ocean, they care about the Chinese. And they still care about the Chinese and so is every other country in the region.