[OFFICIAL] - China

China Launches Stealth Frigate Amid Sea Tensions

http://www.military.com/daily-news/...lth-frigate-amid-sea-tensions.html?ESRC=eb.nl

BEIJING - China is launching a new class of stealth missile frigate amid ongoing tensions with its neighbors over Beijing's maritime claims.

The People's Liberation Army Navy is building a total of 20 Type 056 Jiangdao class frigates to replace older models and bolster its ability to patrol and escort ships and submarines in waters it claims in the South China and East China seas.

The first in the class, No. 582 was formally delivered to the navy on Monday in the metropolis of Shanghai that is home to the country's eastern fleet.

The ships feature a sleek design to reduce clutter and make them harder to spot by radar and come armed with anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles.

The ships also require a crew of just 60, two-thirds fewer than older vessels.

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China Defends Booming Military Spending

http://www.military.com/daily-news/...nds-booming-military-spending.html?ESRC=eb.nl


BEIJING -- Newly installed Chinese leader Xi Jinping faces a key test of his campaign to end corruption and reduce extravagance when outlays for the politically influential military are announced Tuesday after two decades of whopping defense budget increases.

The opening of the national legislature's annual session, and the release of the coming year's military spending, will provide an indication of how Xi and his cohort of new leaders are consolidating power three months into office. With its deep roots in the Communist Party and heavy representation in the legislature, the military always looms large in that political calculus.

The legislature's spokeswoman defended booming military spending Monday, saying the vast investment has contributed to global peace and stability, though she did not announce the coming year's percentage increase, as usually has been done on the eve the legislature's opening.

Following years of double-digit increases, the amount of this year's increase will be a barometer of the complicated relationship between the party leadership and the military. A big boost would show Xi wants robust backing for the People's Liberation Army at a time when China has strident territorial disputes with neighbors and wants to reduce U.S. influence in the region. A smaller increase would show that Xi feels he has strong military backing without the need to pander to its recent demands for ever-larger outlays.

Growth in the military budget should match or exceed last year's rate, if only to keep up with rising inflation, said Ni Lexiong, a military expert at Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. However, he said recent prohibitions on lavish entertainment and perks such as luxury cars should ensure a larger chunk of spending goes to training and weapons development.

"Of course, military development and research in science and technology also require a larger budget, but the growth of military spending must be stable," he said.

The NPC session itself will offer an additional opportunity to assess relations between the military and the 59-year-old Xi, who is the son of a famed revolutionary general and who served briefly in uniform as aide-de-camp to the defense minister some three decades ago.

Xi, who already heads the chairmanship of the party's Central Military Commission, has been generally seen as more agreeable to the military than his predecessor Hu, and has been conspicuous in his attentions to the PLA since taking over as party chief. Those have included visits to naval, air force, infantry and missile bases.

Fu Ying, a spokeswoman for the National People's Congress, said the overall military budget would be released Tuesday. She said China maintained a strictly defensive military posture and cited U.N. peacekeeping missions and anti-piracy patrols in the Gulf of Aden as examples of Beijing's contribution to world peace and stability.

"As such a big country, China's inability to ensure its own security would not be good news for the world," Fu said. "Our strengthening of our defense is to defend ourselves, to defend security and peace, and not to threaten other countries."

Approving the budget is among the key tasks of the session, which this year will see new leaders placed into top government positions after they were elevated within the party at November's Communist Party congress.
Xi, the new party leader, will take over from Hu Jintao as president, and become head of the government's Central Military Commission, as part of China's once-a-decade power transition. In addition, the session approves top Cabinet appointments such as the defense minister.

Chinese defense spending has grown substantially each year for more than two decades, and last year rose 11.2 percent to 670.2 billion yuan ($106.4 billion), an increase of about 67 billion yuan.

Only the United States spends more on defense. Its military budget last year was estimated from $1 trillion to $1.4 trillion.

China's defense spending is a perennial concern for Washington and China's neighbors, who worry that a more powerful and assertive Beijing could upset the U.S.-dominated balance of power in Asia and potentially spark a conflict.

In a standoff between China and Japan over disputed islands in the East China Sea, ships and planes from each side have repeatedly confronted each other in recent months. China's feuds with Vietnam and the Philippines over territory in the South China Sea have also flared up in recent months, while Beijing has been unnerved by the U.S. military's renewed focus on the Asia-Pacific, including plans to station marines in northern Australia on training missions.

Outside concerns about China's military buildup are also fed by doubts over the reliability of the defense budget figure, which is widely believed to exclude foreign military purchases and other items. In its 2012 report on China's military, the Pentagon estimated actual spending of $120-180 billion in 2011, well above China's official figure that year of $91.5 billion.

While the defense budget is all but certain to rise again this year, the military will be under pressure to cut down on waste and corruption.
One especially feisty and widely quoted military commentator, Gen. Luo Yuan, wrote on his microblog recently that wasting funds on expensive cars and flashy but useless projects would ultimately be the PLA's downfall.

"Units that waste money on projects to boost their image and reputation, or that quest for the grandiose and exotic, are in fact frittering away our combat effectiveness," Luo wrote.

In the meantime, the tense situation with Japan and others will ensure that the military continues to enjoy an exalted status, particularly when it comes to funding.

"The more serious the situation becomes, the higher status the military will enjoy and that includes military, social and political status," Ni said.

 

Growing up black in China

[youtube]Y2XAWcs7HbM[/youtube]​

 

I was thinking of this skit Dave Chappelle wrote about Asians.
[YOUTUBE]/pqBu-JBm0Q0[/YOUTUBE]

 

[youtube]rqXAkE-54NU[/youtube]​

 

What's crazy is in this country along with most European and Latin American countries she would be considered top notch. Damn this being black is not for the weak you gotta be Superman strong to deal with the shit we have to.

 

Smithfield Foods to be bought by Chinese firm Shuanghui International

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/...est-pork-producer-smithfield-foods-larry-pope


Smithfield Foods, whose signature hams helped make it the world’s largest pork producer, is being bought by a Chinese firm in a deal that marks China’s largest takeover of an American consumer brand.

The $4.7 Billion puchase by Shuanghui Int. touches several sensitive fronts at once — the quick rise of Chinese investment in the United States, China’s troubled record on the environment and the acquisition of Smithfield’s animal gene technology by a country considered to be America’s chief global competitor.

What’s more, the deal puts a major company from a Chinese industry with a history of food-safety problems in charge of a U.S. firm with past environmental problems of its own.

Separately, U.S. government and business officials often complain that China uses strict control of its market of 1.6 billion people to force American companies that want to do business there to surrender intellectual property.

The deal may become a test of U.S. attitudes toward China as it moves through likely reviews by the Justice Department and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.

With no obvious national security concerns stemming from the production of ham, bacon and sausage, Smithfield chief executive C. Larry Pope said he expects approval. He emphasized that the deal wasn’t about bringing Chinese pork products or management standards to the United States but about sending U.S. products and expertise the other way. The deal will leave intact Smithfield’s management, workforce and 70-year presence in Virginia, he said.

“I know how people react — that we are selling out to the Chinese. This is not selling out to the Chinese. This is Smithfield being part of a global organization,” Pope said at a media briefing after the deal was announced. “There will be no impact on how we do business in America and around the world. .?.?. This is about America exporting.”

Concerns in Tidewater
The acquisition puts under Chinese ownership a prominent American brand and one of Virginia’s best-known companies. The tidewater town of Smithfield has been synonymous with ham production for decades. With roots in a local packing plant, the parent company grew into a conglomerate that includes popular brands such as Armour, sponsors the Richard Petty Motorsports NASCAR team, and has developed genetic strains that the company’s annual report promotes as “the leanest hogs commercially available.”

In the largest single Chinese purchase in the United States, that history and know-how will be absorbed into a firm that has its own global ambitions. Officials of Shuanghui, already the largest pork producer in a nation where pork consumption has exploded in tandem with national income, have said that they want to make their company one of the premier meat producers in the world.

The takeover comes as a surprise, said Ron Pack, president of Smithfield Station, a hotel on the town’s Pagan River waterfront that serves many Smithfield products, including sausages, bacon and pork chops. “I’m a little apprehensive, but I think everything will be fine,” Pack said.

Smithfield Mayor Carter Williams said people in town have expressed concerns about whether jobs might eventually disappear. “I don’t like to see it,” Williams said. “I don’t think a lot of people do. We’re a little hometown place here.”

A top Virginia official said the deal is expected to help the state’s economy.

“We’re looking at this as a really good thing,” said Todd Haymore, Virginia’s secretary of agriculture and forestry. “China represents the grand prize, as far as pork exports are concerned.” Smithfield’s access to that market could lead to significant economic opportunities for smaller growers who supply the company with hogs and for the Port of Virginia, if exports increase.

He said it was “premature” to speculate about issues such as whether the new owners might squeeze small farmers to lower their prices, or whether a substantial jump in exports might raise prices for U.S. consumers.

Debate over food safety
Food-safety advocates criticized the deal.
In China, food safety has become a major issue as the government battles a steady string of reports about tainted milk, rodent meat disguised as lamb, the overuse of pesticides and the dumping of thousands of rotting pigs by farmers into a Shanghai river. Shuanghui closed a plant two years ago after reports that it fed pigs an illegal chemical to make the meat more lean.

Smithfield has had its own environmental and financial troubles, including a $12 million fine levied in 1997 for several thousand clean-water law violations, a clash with North Carolina over manure-filled lagoons, and Humane Society complaints that led the company to agree to change some of its animal-handling practices.

 

China To Send Combat Troops To Mali

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/06/29/china-to-send-combat-troops-to-mali.html?ESRC=eb.nl


Beijing has used the occasion of President Obama's visit to sub-Saharan Africa to announce that it will for the first time deploy combat troops on an overseas peacekeeping mission, contributing soldiers to the United Nations force being assembled for Mali.

"We will send comprehensive security forces to Mali for the first time" Wang Yi, China's foreign minister, said in a speech at a security forum in Beijing on Wednesday, the Financial Times reported.

The expected dispatch of about 500 Peoples Liberation Army combat troops would mark a major shift in policy for China, which has previously limited its peacekeeping contributions to engineers, medical and aid personnel. China currently has about 1,900 troops involved in UN missions, the most of any country on the Security Council.

Aboard Air Force One en route to South Africa from Senegal, Obama downplayed China's growing influence in Africa, part of Beijing's continuing efforts to expand its economic and military clout internationally to challenge the superpower status of the U.S.

In recent years, China has displaced the U.S. as Africa's leading trade partner, and China has major mining and other commercial interests on the continent. While Chinese President Xi Jinping has made frequent trips to sub-Saharan Africa, Obama is on his first substantive visit there.

"This is not the Cold War," Obama said in a session with reporters at the back of the plane. "You've got one global market, and if countries that are now entering into middle-income status see Africa as a big opportunity for them, that can potentially help Africa."

"What we have going for us, though, is our values, our approach to development. Our approach to democracy remains one that is greatly preferable to a country like Senegal," Obama said.

African nations "recognize that China's primary interest is being able to obtain access for natural resources in Africa to feed the manufacturers in export-driven policies of the Chinese economy," he said.

Chinese troops in Mali would signify "a major breakthrough in our participation in peacekeeping," said Chen Qian, head of the UN Association of China, a Chinese think tank, the Financial Times reported. "With this, our contribution will be complete. We will have policemen, medical forces, engineering troops and combat troops."

In a visit to Beijing last week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon praised China for its "strong and growing operational and political engagement with peacekeeping."

The UN peacekeeping force of about 12,800 troops was expected to deploy to Mali next month to begin displacing French troops who entered the country in January to push back Islamic rebels who had taken over large swaths of northern Mali.

France has committed to withdrawing its 4,000 troops by the end of the year but has pledged to leave behind trainers and advisors for Mali's military.

Defense Department officials had no immediate response to the reports of China's coming military involvement in Mali.

The U.S. military has established training and advisory roles with sub-Saharan African nations to shore up local governments and counter the influence of Al Qaeda-affiliated groups, and that role was expected to be enhanced under Army Gen. David Rodriguez, new head of the African Command.

In his initial visits to the region, Rodriguez quietly stopped in Mali to meet his French counterparts and gauge the effectiveness of U.S. assistance to the French effort.

The U.S. provided air transport for French troops during the initial stages of the French campaign, and the U.S. has continued to supply aerial refueling for French Mirage and Rafale fighters in ground support missions. The U.S. has also set up a drone base in neighboring Niger to fly unarmed reconnaissance missions for the French over Mali.

Through June 24, U.S. tankers flying out of the U.S. base at Moron, Spain, have delivered more than 1.5 million gallons of jet fuel to French warplanes, according to Africom.

 

After hearing about Smithfield being sold, I pretty much stop buying commercial brand pork products. Here is what China is getting for their investments, study the brands and trademarks. :vom:

 

Interesting thread.

 

China completes the largest building in the world.

 

What is it, a mall or office complex?

 

The 1.7-million-square-meter building spreads out to accommodate offices, shopping malls, five-star hotels, a Mediterranean village, an indoor beach, a water park, a 14-screen IMAX Cineplex and a huge ice-skating rink.

 

China's Next Big Export: Ready Made Brides

'Leftover women' in China face tough choices in looking for love

http://news.yahoo.com/leftover-women-china-face-tough-choices-looking-love-044726614.html


SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Xu Jiajie has gone on countless blind dates and to numerous match-making events over the past five years in search of a husband.

At 31, the baby-faced office worker from Shanghai is under enormous pressure from family and friends to get married. But the right man is hard to find, she says, a big issue for urban, educated and well-paid Chinese women in a society where the husband's social status is traditionally above the wife's.

"My parents have introduced every bachelor they know," said Xu, who earns double the average wage in Shanghai. "Half of the bachelors I met are quiet and never go out. Outgoing men don't need blind dates."

As couples celebrate the "Qixi" festival on Tuesday, the Chinese equivalent of Valentine's Day, Xu and millions of women like her face stark choices as long-held ideas about matrimonial hierarchy run up against economic and social changes sweeping the world's most populous country.

The term "shengnu" - directly translated as "leftover women" - was coined to refer to professional women who have not married by their late 20s.

"Chinese people often think males should be higher in a relationship in every sense, including height, age, education and salary," Ni Lin, who hosts a popular match-making television show in Shanghai, told Reuters.

"This leads to a phenomenon in which A-grade men marry B-grade women, B-grade men marry C-grade women and C-grade men marry D-grade women. Only A-grade women and D-grade men can't find partners."

In Beijing, more than a third of women in their late 20s and 30s are looking for husbands, according to the dating website Jiayuan.com. Media reports say there may be as many as 500,000 "leftover women" in the capital

 

That is China. Another company is trying to buy Smithfield foods too. The quality is questionalble givin their history.

 

A black man should never be denied of his pork.

Hit up Whole Foods for REAL bacon, it's worth the price. The taste is amazing.:smt023

 

So happy this is happening

 

Black bull, this story has to be bogus or merely anecdotal. With their generational old one child policy, there is a huge female deficit as a result.

 

Why, praytell?? :smt017

 

Good point didn't consider that

I personally can't stand societies that build the concept of marital unions based on solely on social mobility. It strips people down to nothing more than the superficial and affects the way people see each other. It creates the whole human garbage concept ie if you're a store clerk and not a doctor you are some how not worth anything at all.