What Chinese Nobel Winner Really Thinks

If Liu’s politics were well-known, most people would not favour him for a prize, because he is a champion of war, not peace. He has endorsed the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, and he applauded the Vietnam and Korean wars retrospectively in a 2001 essay. All these conflicts have entailed massive violations of human rights. Yet in his article ‘Lessons from the Cold War’, Liu argues that “The free world led by the US fought almost all regimes that trampled on human rights…The major wars that the US became involved in are all ethically defensible.”