This will be a short post because, to be frank, I'm low on Resource Credits, but this point needs to be made.
Does anyone remember when Xi Jinping casually mentioned to Donald Trump that according to China's history, Korea is "part of China?" You may also remember how, when Trump repeated that Xi had stated this, the media blasted Trump as though he had been the one to make the claim (Sonnad), but I digress. If the answer is "no," might I simply suggest doing two quick Google searches: "Goguryeo controversy" and "Northeast Project." In short, Xi let slip that China feels Korea should rightfully be theirs, a position that is reinforced by the bitterness in Shi Zhongwen's tone when writing about how eeeeeeevil Japanese trickery forced China to acknowledge Korea's independence in 1894 (Shi, p.17).
Well, after getting his proverbial butt proverbially handed to him on a proverbial silver platter at APEC, Xi went off to Brunei and the Philippines, and at each stop, China Global Television Network (one of the Party's leading English-speaking propaganda outlets) had interesting and parellel facebook posts.
"About 10 percent of the population in Brunei are of Chinese descent, and they have shown a strong will to inherit the traditional Chinese culture."
-CGTN (1)
"Jose Rizal, whose ancestors came from Jinjiang in China's Fujian Province, was the forerunner of the Philippine independence movement, and is hailed as the founding father of the nation."
-CGTN (2)
The former of these was the caption attached to a link to an article on a school in Brunei that pecializes in Chinese language and culture, which Xi paid special attention to on his trip (Li). There's a word for that: colonization.
In any case, we've all seen how Beijing gets its hackles up over any challenge to their so-called "sovereignty," most notably places where that "sovereignty" is built on historically dubious claims (Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Dongbei/Manchuria) and places where it is outright garbage (Dokklam, Sikkhim, Taiwan, the West Philippine Sea). Xi's China has basically espoused a worldview that anything that was ever, at any point, touched by any empire that could in any way be considered "Chinese," should rightfully belong to the PRC. This is why it is worthy of note that Xi Jinping not only considered important to try and lay a claim to both nations (by claiming paternal heritage over 10% of one nation's population and over the founding father of the other).
Given that Xi has repeatedly stressed his view that everyone of Chinese descent, anywhere in the world, is part of the "Chinese Nation (Xi, p. 69)," coupled with his expectation that all members of this "Chinese Nation(1)" will go along with his "Chinese Dream (Xi, p.38)" and topped off with China's long history of solidifying claims through dissemination of false narratives, it's difficult not to interpret this as the ideological groundwork for a claim of some form of suzerainty over Brunei and the Philippines. Given that he is already laying an illegal maritime claim to more than half the Philippines' EEZ, this should not come as much of a shock.
The Philippines need to get ready. No matter what issues this or that country may have with America's hit-or-miss performance as a world leader, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to look at Tibet or Xinjiang and know that living under Chinese rule would be worse.
(1) A commonly occurring phrase in all of Xi's speeches and writing is the "Chinese Dream of the Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation." At least, that's the white-washed translation the State publishers give to hide the connotations. The words translated here as "Chinese nation" are "Zhonghua Minzu." "Zhonghua" means "people of ZhongGuo," the Chinese name for China. Minzu is a little more complicated. It did not appear in the Chinese language until the late 19th century, and is derived from the Japanese Minzoku, a term simply meaning "the People." The Japanese origin has ethnocentric connotations and was used to justify fascism on the basis of ethnic supremacy, so it's quit interesting that the Chinese chose this term as the backbone of their foreign policy. The Chinese derivative, Minzu, does not directly translate into English. It could be "nation," but the phrase "womende guojia he womende minzu (our homeland and our minzu)" appears several times in Xi's Governance of China. It could also be "culture," but the phrase "our culture and our [minzu]" also appears. The closest translation appears to be "race," though it seems to be an all-inclusive term including Chinese who are not ethnically Han, since Xi is quite emphatic in stating that all ethnic groups in China (especially Tibetans and Uighurs) are "inseparable" parts of this Zhonghua Minzu. It is also very apparent that in Xi's eyes, this Zhonghua Minzu are necessarily bound by a common political, cultural, and (dare I say it?) even religious loyalty to the Communist Party. Perhaps a better translation for practical use, if not an accurate one by origin, would be to translate Zhonghua Minzu as "Chinese Empire."
Works Cited
Books
Shi Zhongwen & Chen Qiaosheng. Trans. Wang Guozheng. China's Culture. Beijing, 2011. China Intercontinental Press.
ISBN 978-7-5085-1298-3
Xi Jinping. The Governance of China; Vol. I. Beijing, 2014. Foreign Languages Press.
ISBN 978-7-119-11394-4
From the Web
CGTN (1). Link to Article About Xi Jinping's Visit to Brunei, November 2018. Facebook. 19 Nov, 2018, 7:40 AM. https://www.facebook.com/ChinaGlobalTVNetwork/posts/2677500018957468?tn=-UC-R . Web, 23 Nov, 2018.
CGTN (2). Video of Xi Jinping In Manila in November 2018. Facebook. 21 Nov, 2018, 5:56 PM. https://www.facebook.com/ChinaGlobalTVNetwork/videos/vb.565225540184937/364421074328155/?type=2&theater . Web, Nov 22, 2018.
Li Jiejun. "Traditional Chinese Culture Preserved in Brunei." CGTN. 18 Nov, 2018. Web, 23 Nov, 2018.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/3d3d674d31676a4e30457a6333566d54/share_p.html?fbclid=IwAR3ptXR6lL6E2zxup5JzaxB_7Oh5Rp0RlePc0iixeLglveKi9qYfHCPG3mc
Sonnad, Nikhil. "Trump Weirdly Says Korea Was “Part of China,” Which is Totally Wrong and Could Enrage South Korea." Quartz. 19 Apr, 2017. Wed, 23 Nov, 2018.
https://qz.com/962409/donald-trump-and-korea-trump-makes-false-claim-that-korea-was-part-of-china/