Posting is slow this week because I am working on a couple of projects, including the Science, Strategy and War roundtable that will occur at Chicago Boyz, starting next Monday. I also have a number of important papers to read for several friends and I am taking tonight off from blogging in order to catch up on these commitments.
Today I realized that while I decided this in concert with some of the participants it was not all of the participants, nor did I ever 
send out an email. At least as far as I recall. OTOH, I don’t think anyone will object to this either:
The symposium on Science, Strategy and War: The Strategic Theory of John Boyd by Colonel Frans Osinga, PhD, to be held at Chicago Boyz will take place the week of February 1st and not, as originally scheduled, this week. My apologies to any whose schedule may have been disrupted.
There will be more timely announcements and email prior to the new start date.
One of my distinguished co-bloggers at Chicago Boyz, John Jay, penned a truly outstanding post on China, incorporating history, culture, economics and linguistics, using the famous Manchurian warlord and opium addict, ” the Young Marshal ” Chang Hsüeh-liang, as a springboard:
“….China has historically allowed certain social forces to compete with loyalty to the state. Linguistic (and in the cases of the Hui and Uyghur, religious) groups have always retained a large amount of autonomy through the provincial governments, and in some cases provinces such as Guandong can almost be thought of as a separate country within China due to their linguistic (non-Mandarin) identity and economic self sufficiency. But Guandong gets little voice in Beijing relative to the economic might of the Pearl River Delta. Cantonese don’t care, as long as the kleptocracy in Beijing leaves them alone (after they make their formal obeisance) most of the time, and does not attempt to steal too much wealth. That may change as peasants out West mobilize and force the central government to send more goodies their way. China never hit upon the Anglosphere’s solution of a Republican governmental federation of competing interests akin to either Great Britain or the competing American states – the Imperial authorities always wished to pretend that they were in complete control, while ceding a lot of practical authority to the provinces.
Conflicts between the linguistic periphery and the Mandarin-speaking center have contributed to the ebb and flow of centralized power in China since even before the Ten kingdoms of the South broke away from the Five Dynasties that succeeded the Tang. The Chinese have historically seen history as cyclical, rather than linear. I think that this at least in part stems from the fact that since the fall of the Tang Dynasty, China has never bitten the bullet to reform itself by completely rethinking its social system. Systems have arisen as kludges to deal with a particular problem, but have never dealt with the fundamental flaws in society, only with their surface manifestations. As James Sheridan wrote in “Chinese Warlord: The Career of Feng Yu-hsiang” :
Read in full here.
A DIVERSION FROM THE USUAL SUBJECT MATTER
Over at Chicago Boyz.
A DIVERSION FROM THE USUAL SUBJECT MATTER
A DIVERSION FROM THE USUAL SUBJECT MATTER
A DIVERSION FROM THE USUAL SUBJECT MATTER
A DIVERSION FROM THE USUAL SUBJECT MATTER
REVIEWING LEARNING TO EAT SOUP WITH A KNIFE
“Learning to Eat Soup With A Knife -Book Review” is now up at Chicago Boyz.
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