Great Quake of China 2008 reveals cracks in the Empire!

The recent earthquakes and after shocks in Sichuan Province has been devasting and very hard to watch. This is a mega-disaster for this emerging world power and has revealed cracks and weakness of the corruption that permeates the communist chinese dicatorship. Many of the impacted citizens have turned from sorrow to anger at the shoddy construction and inability to help victims in isolated areas.

Death Toll sparks anger!

Will this disaster spur the beginning of the end the dictorship of the communist? I believe that the economic downturn, Tibet, earthquake and the olympics maybe too much strain for the house of cards of corruption that has tried to keep the horse of freedom in the barn.

I hope that they the people can recover from this devastation, but if the rule of the communist is broken it will be at least one silver lining in an otherwise terrible human tragedy.

i read both chinese and western report about the quake and so dissapointed for your biased media.i really hope you could read chinese and go to chinese websites to check it out,i was in tiananmen square yesterday,the national mourning day,after observeing 3 minute silence,the square bursted outpouring patriotism ,never before i saw the people so strongly rallied around the government.i take you dont understand chinese characters,so i could give you some photoes taken from the square yesterday.you should go and check them out.

forum.xinhuanet.com...

Mon May 19, 12:12 PM ET

PINGTONG, China (Reuters) - From tent cities in Sichuan province to Beijing's Tiananmen Square, sirens wailed and millions of Chinese stood for three minutes on Monday to mourn the tens of thousands who died in last week's earthquake.
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The moment of grief was observed across the vast country of 1.3 billion people at 2:28 p.m., exactly a week after the 7.9 magnitude quake that ravaged the southwestern province of Sichuan.

Several thousand people gathered in Tiananmen Square in central Beijing, standing silently around a flagpole from which the red Chinese flag waved at half-mast. They burst into chants when the three minutes passed.

In unison, the huge crowd shouted "Jia you! Jia you!," an exhortation that can be loosely translated as "Go! Go!", while punching the air with their fists.

Others shouted out "Long live China!," "Long live Sichuan!," and "Long live Wenchuan!"

reply to post by mel1962

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I have not seen many reports on anger yet, however, I have seen a great increase in national pride.... now of course.. I don't think it was because of anything the Government did, it was just a national tradgedy.

In reality though, it should show to the world that China is honestly nothing but a house of cards..

Their construction is flawed beyond belief, they have no standards or guidlines..

Their military is not even able to rescue people let alone fight foriegn wars..

So many believe China is a rising world power.. and it is, no doubt about it.. but it is so internally weak that it will be decades before a change is seen and any real threat is obvious.

People can mourne even when they know they have messed up as a nation, I know Burma is getting a media backlash for their lack of organisation. Not sure how it would change things in China overall but a sense of unity might change a few things and could bring on Spiritual awareness which could open for greater cultural diversity in understanding, but Communist rule does not speak up for how people feel, they are just stuck in that system.

that government at least brought people wealth and made china economically the fastest growing nation in the world.no other country can mobilise all the country's resources to fight against the disaster like china,so in term of mobiliastion,centralised governments do have their own merits.dont take anything for granted,seeing is believing.l lived in china and the states long enough to know what is really going on in both countries,and some people here never been to the country they are ignorantly talking about.that really frustrates me.

stop talking about war,what made you mind jump from the quake to the war?we are peaceloving people,when 911 happened my heart bled for those who suffered,as well as the time the hurricane hit new orleans,two cities i both lived ,come on,be a human.

While the earthquake in china is a major disaster, as is the disaster in Burma, its ok to ridicule the Chinese way of life and condemn their response, which i thought was pretty good once it got going, i fear you are forgetting Hurricane katrina? and the terrible response which left so many Americans in a fight for survival.

The amount of Chinese bashing that has been going on recently, it feels like another attempt at pushing and flexing muscles, all we seem to hear is China this, China has done that, perhaps if Administrations practiced what they preach then Burma is the ideal place to invade and save the people.

It has nothing to do with Communism, it has more to do with what can be gained, by trying to make the world see evil where there is well a lot less than other places in the world, i myself applaud China for their effort.

reply to post by haidian

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I agree the Chinese Government opened up and allow something the Russian Government was affraid of, people with money and influence, the state did not short change or steal profits as in Venezuela, natural disasters happen all over the world but this government did not wait, it acted. Peace

Those pictures are absolutely awesome!

I see a strong people and an honorable people. Things this nation has forgotten.

Thank you very much for sharing them.



[edit on 20-5-2008 by garyo1954]

thank you for your kind and heartwarming reply.what doesnt kill you only makes you strong,the earthquake hit area is a remote mountainous area ,wont affect china much.but the caring shown by the people and the government is so overwhelming and gives people the faith to make china a better nation.

Considering the U.S. has shown itself to be rather inept in the handling of emergencies, I don't see how China has done much worse under their own unique circumstances.

If any country is to be "perfect" in terms of emergency management and disaster relief, it is the U.S. We have a massive, centralized federal bureaucracy, tons of funding, some of the most expansive training in terms of emergency management, yet our response to Hurricane Katrina was just a travesty. I can hardly wait to see how we'll respond to an enemy attack on our shores.

If nothing else, this disaster should prompt other governments to take a look at their own situation - because there are many places in the world with sub-standard construction that could not have withstood this quake.

Japan, for example.

Gov't says 10,000 schools need quake-resistance measures

How does Japan, the most seismically active nation in the world come to be in this situation? simple: buildings are constructed, and they remain standing while new technology and construction techniques are introduced. Upgrades get lost in the budget. Eventually, you get to a point where a 40-year old building is declared sub-standard.

If you take a look at the pics from the China quake, you'll see that many new buildings are still standing. Older buildings, like everywhere else in the world, were built to a lower standard. If the quake had not happened, most of these buildngs would likely have been replaced over the next 20 years.

Sadly, this situation is common and widespread - and will likely be repeated. There are many areas of the world where we know that there have been large-scale quakes in the last few hundred years. The New Madrid fault, for one. Vancouver is another. NYC is another. Toronto is another. Every few years, on a slow news day, there seems to be a piece with an earthquake expert talking about how these areas are unprepared for a large quake. With Vancouver, they've started to take it seriously, but all estimates show that the damage would be catastrophic if a 7.8M quake were to strike. Toronto - forget it. A few recently constructed office towers would likely survive, without the glass. Most homes, if they survive the shake, will be plywood shells surrounded by piles of crumbled brick fascia. No one is prepared. Even in Tokyo, they say an 8.0 quake could have a death toll in the 100,000s - due to the collapse of old, sub-standard buildings.

The lack of attention to this problem is not unique to China. We have all been ignoring this problem.

Oddly, I think that China is in a better position to deal with the problem than most other countries. The word went out yesterday: $10 Billion US in reconstruction funds, halt on all government-funded construction projects until reconstruction is complete, and every ministry is to take a 5% cut to cover the cost without breaking the budget. I would not be surprised to see the army employed as construction labour before the end of the month.

How does this response to the crisis compare, in terms of speed and efficiency?

It won't end the Communist dictatorship, because the Communist dicatorship has a large technologically advanced military behind them thanks in part to a large trade deficit with the US over the last 16 years.