By Zhang Weiwei,
Published in People’s Daily, Sept 20, 2022:
Originally published in the Chinese language website People’s Daily, this short but significant article by Zhang Weiwei looks at how the United States has a history of repeatedly instigating or being involved in “colour revolutions” in many countries across the world, and their actions are seriously endangering world peace, stability, and development.
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Original title: Create chaos and turmoil, the myth of American democracy is shattered
For a long time, under the guise of “democracy, freedom, and human rights,” the United States has supported pro-US forces around the world, instigated “color revolutions,” and created separatist confrontations, leading to the change of power in some countries and falling into the quagmire of political turmoil, economic decline, and people’s livelihood. What the United States has done has seriously jeopardized world peace, stability and development.
Looking back at history, the United States and the West have repeatedly instigated or been involved in “color revolutions.” From the collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the upheavals in Eastern Europe to the “Rose Revolution” in Georgia in 2003, from the “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine in 2004 to the “Tulip Revolution” in Kyrgyzstan in 2005, from the “Arab Spring” in 2011 to the “Maidan Revolution” in Ukraine in 2014, in addition to the “Snowflake Revolution” in Belarus in 2005, the “Orange Storm” in Azerbaijan in 2005, the “Cedar Revolution” in Lebanon in 2005, and the “Maidan Revolution” in Ukraine in 2014. Green Revolution”, and so on. If you count from the Cold War period, there are many regime changes with “color revolution” overtones. Statistics show that for decades, the CIA has overthrown or attempted to topple at least 50 foreign governments, even though the CIA has publicly acknowledged only 7 cases. Other statistics show that between 1946 and 2000, the United States tried to influence elections in 45 countries 81 times.
The “color revolution” instigated by the United States has been “successful” many times, and the United States even considers itself a “victor of the Cold War.” However, since entering the 21st century, especially since the 2008 international financial crisis, its “color revolution” has frequently been “frustrated”. In some countries and regions, their governments have quickly maintained stability and stopped the violence, thwarting the interference of external forces; In other countries and regions, Western-style democracy has brought great chaos and even war due to “disobedience to the soil and water”, which has aroused strong condemnation from the people of the countries concerned and the international community.
“Painting bread to fill hunger” is a major trick used by the United States to incite a “color revolution”. The United States and its Western partners have carried out large-scale ideological and cultural infiltration of the target country, cultivated a large number of so-called elites who are only beautiful and Western-oriented, and invented the myth of Western-style democracy, that is, as long as the Western-style democratic system is adopted, the difficulties faced by the target country, such as poverty, unemployment, and corruption, can be solved.
The Arab Spring, which erupted around 2011, speaks volumes. According to the book “The Hidden Side of the Arab Revolution” written by French scholar Eric Denasay and others, so-called non-governmental organizations such as the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House, the United States Agency for International Development, and the Open Society Institute have spent more than 10 years training a large number of online writers who speak Arabic as their mother tongue to form the “Internet Arab League”. They set up topics on the Internet, called for wind and rain, and attributed the economic, social, and political developments and existing problems in the Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa to “authoritarian” systems, emphasizing that only through Western-style democracy can the so-called problems be fundamentally solved
These institutions systematically train the backbone of street politics, with specialized courses ranging from the dress and signs of demonstrators to the uniform gestures of commanders at all levels to the use of social media for viral disinformation. Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo publicly admitted: “I served as the director of the CIA. We lie, we deceive, we steal. We also have a course dedicated to teaching these. This is the glory of America’s continuous exploration and progress. When there is an “opportunity” in the target country, these institutions immediately carry out political incitement through various means such as the Internet, and engage in square politics and street riots.
After the “color revolution” was temporarily won in some countries and regions, it often did not last long. These countries and regions began to encounter more and more prominent contradictions. The confrontation between Westernizers and localists, the confrontation between different religions and sects, and the confrontation between different ethnic cultures and even languages have all seriously intensified the confrontation, resulting in social disorder, business failure, capital outflow, and economic recession. In the final analysis, the process of ignoring a country’s unique history, culture, political system, religious belief, ethnic balance, social environment, etc., and adopting the so-called “confrontational democracy” of the West is often a process in which various contradictions are constantly intensified.
Today the “Arab Spring” has become the “Arab Winter”: Libya is torn apart and in a state of civil war; Yemen has experienced multiple wars at the same time: inter-tribal wars, sectarian wars, wars between government forces and al-Qaida, and the continued activities of separatist forces in the south; Syria has been “hellishly destroyed”. Some international assessments show that the Arab Spring has cost $900 billion in infrastructure damage to countries such as Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen, and that these events have also caused more than 1.4 million deaths and more than 15 million refugees.
After Ukraine’s independence in 1991, it maintained relatively smooth relations with the West and Russia. In 2004 and 2014, Ukraine saw the “Orange Revolution” and the “Maidan Revolution”. The Associated Press has disclosed a number of information that proved that the United States had interfered in Ukraine’s 2004 elections, including funding a number of political organizations and paying the price for opposition leaders’ visits to the United States. During the riots in Kiev’s Independence Square, then-Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and then-Senator John McCain went directly to Independence Square to support Ukrainian pro-Western factions and distribute food to protesters. An exposed recording at the time showed that Nuland was directly pointing fingers at the question of who would be Ukraine’s prime minister during a phone call with the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.
The United States has instigated “color revolutions” around the world, without realizing that its democratic aura has long since fallen into the mire. On January 6, 2021, the U.S. Capitol Hill riots shocked the world. The New York Times article wrote that the riots were “a blow to the image of America’s beacon of democracy.” German President Steinmeier believes that the violence in the US Capitol is the result of US politicians spreading many lies, contempt for democracy, and inciting hatred and division. Richard Haas, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, also lamented: “From now on, no one in the world will ever see, respect, fear or depend on us in the same way.” If there is a beginning date for the post-American era, it is almost certainly today. ”
The United States incites “color revolutions” everywhere in order to maximize US interests. As for the essence of the United States promoting hegemony in the name of democracy, the French media pointed out to the point that “democracy” has become a “weapon of mass destruction” of the United States. Instigating “color revolutions,” interfering in other countries’ internal affairs, and overthrowing other countries’ political regimes will seriously deviate from the basic norms governing international relations and the general trend of historical development, which will only accelerate the overdraft of the US national credibility and further collapse its international image.
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Zhang Wewei is a political scientist and writer, a professor of international relations at Fudan University, Dean of the Institute of Chinese Studies at the university, where he is also the director of the China Institute
