China I: Empire State, But Who's Empire?

October 1, 1999, Beijing. I awoke at 4:30am, dressed, grabbed my packed bags, and went to the lobby of The International Club Hotel (now St. Regis) and got into the car. It was a bright cloudless morning, a good day for even a bad parade. On the way to the old airport, I passed busload after busload of colorfully dressed Chinese, mostly very young, heading for their places in thousands of lines to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the People's Republic of China.

I was returning home after helping to lead a group of executives on a journey across China, from Kashgar in the west, down the Yangtse, into Hunan to see a village election, through Shanghai with its new Stock Exchange, into the ancient capitol. We carried 40 capitalists around with the stated purpose of exploring a huge potential market. The real purpose was to burn several millions to make those guys, and a few women, feel important. They were so over-confident and self-involved, of course, that they didn't look very closely. So, they saw what they wanted to see. Easy future revenue.

But I and the expedition team had seen something else on our 6 trips between November 1998 and that day in Beijing. We had been in the big cities (China has no small ones), up and down a long river before its rapid rise, walked the villages, negotiated the deals, dined with the local Communist Party hosts, met with Foreign Affairs, and been watched, tutored, translated. In short, we had been managed into doing exactly what our hosts wanted us to do, while thinking that we were in charge, at least in the beginning.

China was and is in charge. If you doubt this, perhaps you have not seen the Empire State Building. It was lit with the colors of the People's Republic in celebration of their 6oth Anniversary. That's right, Mao's triumph being hailed in our own backyard. We are bogged down in two wars, healthcare, subprime slop, and our endless search for self-gratification. The Chinese are celebrating our troubles as much as their "triumph."

Funny. Our Team had argued in 1999 that it might not look so great for these mighty capitalists to be seen and photographed at the 50th Anniversary. We actually had to explain that to Management. We were, in effect, sneaking these people out of Beijing, while nobody could see them. I had chosen the old part of the airport, where Nixon had famously arrived, because it was deserted. Our efforts had not deterred the Chairman of our own company, who stayed to celebrate with his new young friend. The friend's company would soon buy our company, still the worst deal in the history of corporate America, since nearly $200Billion in market cap disappeared in the Bursting Bubble.

Until today, I'd always thought of that deal as Mao's revenge. But, I think that he'd be more pleased to see us celebrating his particular brand of totalitarian murder and idiocy, now funded by state capitalism, in the middle of Manhattan.

Empire indeed.

- Ed: Today's post is dedicated to my friend and colleague, Nini Gussenhoven, with whom I travelled many of those Chinese trails and waters. She left us behind far too early; however, she lives on in the words of her twin brother, John, in his new book: Crisscrossing America: Discovering America From The Road. I am sure that Nini was hanging on to him mile after mile as he road his bike. You must buy this book when it debuts next week. We also remember a courageous soldier and friend, John Blewett.