The West's modern "witch hunt." Cartoon: Vitaly Podvitski

Editor's Note:

There have been signs of easing tensions in China-Australia relations recently, with the holding of the China-Australia High-Level Dialogue in September and a potential trip to China by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese later this year. To what extent can China-Australia ties be repaired? Will the Albanese government give pragmatic cooperation a priority? Colin Mackerras (Mackerras), a fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and world-renowned sinologist, shared his insights with Global Times (GT) reporter Su Yaxuan. 

GT: To what extent can China-Australia ties be repaired? And what kind of relationship would be most beneficial to Australia?

Mackerras: I think it's a good thing that there are signs of improvement. If we have more trade, that's a good thing. I hope we can make some agreements that will help both sides. I don't think it's going to go back to the way it was before. I say this mainly because of these other things that Americans seem to be doing. For instance, the US, UK and Australia agreed on a nuclear-powered submarine project. What that does is take away our independence to some extent as well, and it ties the US and Australia together. Although it could be argued that it's not against China, it seems to me that it is and the Americans designed it to be just that, against China.

I think that's extremely unfortunate. Australia is heavily dependent on the Americans. In a context where the US doesn't want us to be friendly with China, they tend to be very hostile, and I think that's very unfortunate and very unfair. Australia is giving signs that it wants to be friends with China. At the same time, it's also digging up unfounded criticisms against China. That's unfair and unnecessary.

When you're talking about relations, you can talk about geopolitical relations, but you can also talk about people-to-people relations. I've now been to China more times than I can count since I first went there in 1964. I love going to China. I have a lot of friends there.

We can develop these people-to-people relations in many different ways. Students can go to school in another country. Scholars from both countries can conduct joint research. But also, you can have students coming from China to Australia and from Australia to China. I think tourism is a very interesting phenomenon, it can be economic, but I think it can also be people-to-people. When people go to another country as tourists, they're interested in its culture, they learn about its culture, they meet people, they make friends. 

Despite what the Australian government is doing and despite the policy it has toward the Americans, which I am very much against, we can still make good friends with China. We can still have good people-to-people relationships. We can still receive Chinese students and Australian students can go to China, and we can also improve tourism. I'm very optimistic about all of this.

GT: How do you think the trade and economic ties between the two countries will develop in the years to come? Will the Albanese government view pragmatic cooperation as a priority to help bolster Australia's economy?

Mackerras: I think Albanese will develop economic trade and ties. I know there have been a few problems which people have talked about a lot here in Australia, but I don't see them as being fundamentally impossible to solve. With a bit of goodwill on both sides, I expect them to be solved gradually over time which would be good for both countries. Australia's economy is very closely aligned with China's at the moment. I don't want Australia to trade with other countries at the expense of trading with China. I think it's very valuable for Australia to trade with China and I expect that to happen and continue to happen.

GT: What are the main biases that currently exist in the West toward China? What do we most need to break? How should we do it?

Mackerras: It seems to me that the most difficult area is that the West is determined to see China as a threat. The reason is it wants to stay on top and it's not willing to let anyone else challenge its hegemony. It doesn't want this multipolar world. China often talks about this multipolar world, and it is not the only one. Most people seem to want a multipolar world. But the Americans and the West are determined not to have that because they think it is against them. They want to be No.1 and everyone else should do what they're told.

I think that's the main bias, but there are other biases too, because the Western media tend to put everything that happens in China in a negative light. Here in Australia, we have the Murdoch Press journals, like The Australian, and there are others, like the Fairfax Press and they mostly seem to put a negative spin on everything China does. 

The media in Australia is currently indulging in a sort of triumphalism that China's economic success can't last. That seems to me to be very wrong. Looking at the big picture, China's economy is still growing well and will recover from present difficulties.

But as for how you're going to get over this, I don't know, but I do think promoting people-to-people relationships is very helpful indeed and an excellent way to go. 

In an interview released Sunday, the US’ NASA chief once again smeared China's space missions and vowed to beat China in the “moon race.” The latest barrage of attacks was slammed by Chinese experts as a reflection of a lack of confidence and a dangerous, narrow Cold War mentality in the US.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson accused China of being “one of the very few nations” that would not be partners with the US and that it is being “very secretive” in terms of space programs in an interview with Nikkei Asia published on Sunday.

In the meantime, Nelson stated that he believes the US will beat China in terms of sending a manned spacecraft to the moon. 

The two countries both have similar visions to launch a crewed moon probe in the next decade. China announced that its manned rocket for the mission is expected to be constructed by 2030, while NASA has pushed back its moon landing to 2025 or later. 

Nelson's unsubstantiated accusations fully reflect that the US lacks confidence in its aviation development, experts told the Global Times.

Nelson's renewed hype of the Chinese aviation threat theory is actually a common NASA trope, spinning an external excuse to spur the US Congress to pass more related budgets, Song Zhongping, a space analyst and TV commentator, told the Global Times on Sunday.

"China has never said it aims to engage in a so-called space race with the US," he said, noting that the past race with the Soviet Union and Cold War mindset trapped the US.

In fact, publicly attacking China’s space programs has become normal for NASA in the past few months. In September, Nelson accused China of lacking needed transparency over issues. In July, the NASA chief blatantly claimed that China is “trying to occupy the moon.” In May, he said that China stole the US’ space technology. 

"These accusations fired by NASA are unfounded and unjustified," Song said. "China has always had a cooperative and open attitude in the space sector."

In the 1990s, China launched satellites for other countries and provided space delivery services to other countries. Now, with its space station, return satellites and target vehicles, China has also been providing piggyback services and giving platforms to other countries’ projects.

China issued an action statement in November outlining its plan for promoting further international cooperation on space technology and exploration, working with other countries and international organizations within the framework of the United Nations. 

Observers point out that China’s space station is facing all countries in the world that are willing to cooperate, including developing countries, which is the real sense of an international space station. On the contrary, the space station created by the US is precisely a club for the rich, and it is very difficult for developing countries to get their hands on it.

In 2011, the US Congress passed the Wolf Amendment, a law that prohibits NASA to engage in cooperation with China and China-affiliated organizations. “Now that China has moved into the top echelon of space-faring nations with its own innovations, the US is starting to worry even more,” Song said. “The country realizes that China's momentum is going to be strong and even limitless, which needed to be contained.”

Such a narrow US mindset and approach would not only be unhelpful to the two countries' technological development, but also could even overshadow the progress of human technology, analysts said.

If the US could treat China as a partner and not as an enemy, it would promote the humankind's ability to explore space to soar, Song noted.

Deadly wildfires in Hawaii, which caused the biggest death toll in more than a century in the US and forced thousands to evacuate from their homes, expose the incompetence of the US government, said analysts, with many local residents who survived the disaster posting videos on social media criticizing the problematic response of local authorities and poor early warning system. Residents also criticized US mainstream media reports, saying this was not just a natural disaster, but also a man-made calamity. 

Chinese analysts and web users are paying attention to the horrible tragedy that Americans have suffered, as the hashtags on Sina Weibo about "Hawaii wildfires" have received more than 71.52 million views on Tuesday. Experts said the response of the US government made the US look "unlike a developed country."

A massive blaze destroyed much of the town of Lahaina, on Maui over the weekend. As of Monday afternoon, officials confirmed 99 people have died. Hawaii Governor Josh Green told the media that the death toll would likely increase "very significantly" and could "double or even triple" over the next 10 days, according to CNN.

Green said on Sunday that there was "very little left" of Lahaina, and some 1,300 people remained missing, according to CBS News.

Many people including survivors uploaded videos to break the silence on social media networks to heavily criticize the incompetence of the government and the problematic response and early warning system. Some questioned reports by the mainstream media and said it was not a natural disaster, and the death toll could be far greater than reported.

Some of them said warning sirens did not sound and people received no warning about the wildfire, and they were not informed about evacuation. Some complained about the disorganized response and poor traffic system that trapped the people who wanted to escape and the rescue personnel who wanted to enter the island, and that donations have not been handed to the people in need. Some relief materials were looted as local authorities failed to restore public order.

Hawaii has got a massive outdoor public safety early warning system, with more than 400 sirens to remind people of threats like tsunamis, and Maui has 80 of these sirens, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

In 2018, the system mistakenly informed the people of Hawaii state that "a ballistic missile is coming" due to human error, and in 2019, the system went wrong again and caused panic among locals. But this time, it failed to warn people effectively, and the state attorney has vowed to investigate, Xinhua reported on Tuesday.

The Washington Post reported on Saturday that "Residents of Lahaina, the historic former Hawaiian capital that became an inferno," have criticized what they called inadequate warnings of the sudden firestorm and said they are now being left to fend for themselves in its wake.

"I feel like the citizens of this island have been called upon, maybe by a higher power, to actually help because no one else is helping," said Kai Lenny, a professional surfer, according to the Washington Post.

Many Chinese netizens do not understand why the powerful US military force can allow Americans to feel helpless during the disaster when the Pacific Fleet is right there in Hawaii. A comment said "why don't US military troops go to rescue their people in the disaster area?" In China, the military, police and other professional rescue forces will respond immediately to rescue people every time when disasters occur in any location in China.

Lü Xiang, an expert on US studies and a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times that the response of the US military or national guards this time has no comparison to their fast reaction after the Capitol Hill attack in 2021, and this means the decision makers of the country did not pay enough attention to this disaster that caused huge casualties. 

"From the early warning system to the response after the disaster, the performance of the US government this time just makes the US look unlike a developed country," Lü said.

US President Joe Biden was in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, over the weekend and was asked during a bike ride on Sunday morning whether he would go to Maui to assess the devastation. He replied, "We're looking at it." After a visit to the beach later that day, Biden was asked about the rising death toll on the island and replied, "No comment," according to US media.

The comment sparked a backlash, Fox News reported, including by former Hawaii state representative Mark Kaniela Ing, a Democrat who now serves as national director of the Green New Deal Network. "I campaigned for you. Now, when I lose dozens of my friends, family, and neighbors. This?" Kaniela Ing wrote in a now-deleted post.

Kaniela Ing told Fox News Digital in a phone interview Monday that he found Biden's remark "shocking" and out of character.

This kind of disaster is closely related to climate change but the Biden administration shows limited sincerity in restoring international cooperation to handle climate change issues, said analysts, adding that a disaster like the Hawaii wildfires has not received enough attention from mainstream US media, and people from other states do not seem to care much what is happening in Hawaii.

Lü said "when I open the websites or apps of US mainstream media like The New York Times and CNN, the headline story today is about [former president] Donald Trump's legal issues, and other prominent news stories are about Ukraine, but the reports about the most deadly wildfire in more than a century in the US, while the death toll is keep updating, can only be found at the bottom."

This could be embarrassing for rattlesnakes and other vipers: Their long-standing reputation as the snakes with the fastest strikes on Earth just got bit by the common Texas rat snake.

In lab tests biting a stuffed glove, Western rattlesnakes averaged speeds of 2.95 meters per second and Western cottonmouths averaged 2.98 m/s, says functional morphologist David Penning of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. But Texas rat snakes, familiar farmyard chasers of pest rodents, averaged 2.67 m/s. Statistically that’s a three-way tie, Penning and his colleagues report March 16 in Biology Letters.

Strikes were over quickly but all species subjected their brains to impressive acceleration. Rat snakes accelerated their head more on average (190 meters per second2)
than what a fighter pilot experiences when taking off from an aircraft carrier (27 to 49 m/s 2 ).
Penning’s point is not that vipers are slow, but that other snakes also evolved a lightning strike. “They have to eat too,” he says. Startled mammals have been clocked activating a muscle in as little as 14 to 151 milliseconds. Snakes in Penning’s tests reached their targets in 50 to 90 milliseconds, literally before some creatures could move a muscle. And if you blink — for a human average of 220 milleseconds — you miss it all.

In narrow blood vessels, tumor cells go marching one by one.

By unfolding into a cellular chain, clusters of cancer cells can slide through capillary tubes less than 10 micrometers wide, Sam Au of Harvard Medical School and colleagues report April 18 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The cells pass through the tubes in single file, each squeezing into an oblong shape and clinging to a neighbor or two. After arriving in roomier quarters, the cells regroup into round clumps, the scientists report.
Clumps of cancer cells that break off tumors and travel through the bloodstream to new sites in the body are known to spread cancer more efficiently than single cells. Many scientists believed, though, that hefty cell clusters were unable to squeeze through the body’s narrowest blood vessels.

Experiments showed that human breast and prostate cancer cells used this single-file strategy to travel through lab-made tubes, human cell‒lined tubes and the blood vessels of live zebrafish. These results could offer insights into ways to foil cancer’s spread.

Fountains of gas from a handful of remote galaxies all seem to be pointing in roughly the same direction, a new study reports. If the result holds up, it puts a new twist on how galaxies and black holes arise from the larger cosmic web, though some researchers worry that the alignment might just be a chance occurrence.

Out of a group of 64 galaxies that are blasting out radio waves, about a dozen are spewing jets of gas that are roughly aligned with one another, astronomers report in the June 11 Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Letters. The galactic geysers are powered by supermassive black holes whose magnetic fields launch some infalling debris into intergalactic space. If the geysers are aligned, that means the black holes are all spinning in the same direction. And that means these galaxies, which are spread over roughly a hundred million light-years, might all have been influenced by the larger scaffolding from which they formed.
“Naively we expect that shouldn’t happen,” says Ryan Hickox, an astrophysicist at Dartmouth College who was not involved with this study. Black holes, even supermassive ones, are minuscule compared with filaments of galaxies that can span hundreds of millions of light-years. These filaments are the threads along which most matter in the universe congregates, branching through space like a cosmic spider web. Though galaxies live there, they are thought to form and develop independently of what the filaments are doing. A twisting filament should have no influence over what’s happening around one of its resident black holes.

And yet that’s the explanation favored by study lead Russ Taylor, an astrophysicist at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. “What we’re seeing is the result of a very large region in the early universe spinning coherently in the same direction,” he says. If that’s true, it adds a “new wrinkle to explain how large-scale structure formed.”

Taylor and colleagues found the apparent alignment while probing a patch of sky in the constellation Draco with the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope in India. They don’t know the distances to the galaxies, but all seem to sit near a galactic supercluster whose light takes about 7.4 billion years to reach Earth — just over half the age of the universe.

Other researchers using different techniques have previously reported similar alignments among another set of galaxies (SN: 12/27/14, p. 6). Both studies, though, relied on a small number of galaxies, which means the alignment might not be statistically significant.

“If an alignment like this exists, it’s very interesting,” says astrophysicist Michael DiPompeo, also at Dartmouth. “But I’m not super convinced that it’s really there.” While Taylor and colleagues argue that the alignment is not a statistical fluke, DiPompeo did his own calculations that suggest otherwise. He simulated observations of 64 randomly oriented galaxy jets — the computer equivalent of repeatedly dropping a bunch of toothpicks on a table and noting where each was pointed. “I could pretty regularly get patterns that look like this,” he says.
It’s also hard to imagine how such an alignment, if it was present as the galaxies formed, could persist for billion of years, he says. “It’s not like [galaxies] form in the early universe and then just sit there blasting these jets.” Galaxies grow by colliding with other galaxies, which can change how the galaxies and their central black holes rotate.

Both DiPompeo and Hickox say it’s worth probing other galactic gatherings, though, before dismissing these alignments as a coincidence. If similar orientations appear in many galaxy clusters, then the researchers could be on to something. Hickox would also like to see distances to these galaxies. If it turns out the galaxies sit at wildly varying distances from Earth, he says, then the alignment is less likely to be real.

Taylor hopes to do just that. Colleagues are planning observations at other telescopes that will let them determine how far away these galaxies are. And Taylor is gearing up for a more thorough investigation over a much larger patch of sky with a new radio observatory in South Africa called MeerKAT, which should be ready for operation later this year.