Reflections on Hong Kong, China, politics, community and life

A rich conversation between Jane Craigie and her father, Iain Craigie covering Iain’s two postings in Hong Kong in the late 1950s and late 1980s. 

Not only does the discussion delve into China’s might in our world, it also covers the power of politics, community and health.

The podcast is fascinating and also gives inspiration to anyone thinking that old age should diminish a person. Iain proves that it clearly doesn’t.

Transcript

Unknown Speaker  0:09  
Welcome to the spy who raised me podcast conversations between a daughter and her father. Yes, you've guessed it. He was a spy.

Unknown Speaker  0:20  
Hi, I'm Jane Craigie and I'm here with my dad in Craigie. And we've had about two and a half months where we haven't recorded partly because of COVID. And partly because dad's been really busy, as have I, but

Unknown Speaker  0:37  
tell us what you've been up to with the local community.

Unknown Speaker  0:41  
Yeah, we, with the pandemic and other pressures on village life, small village in Oxfordshire. A, I decided that

Unknown Speaker  0:54  
this was a good time to look at options and how we could assist in doing what we should all be doing. And that is looking after this, this world of ours and it kind of fitted in it just happened that in the village, which is a quite a privileged village in Oxfordshire, a with a lot of big houses and a lot of land around it. And oddly enough, they have some

Unknown Speaker  1:26  
allotments.

Unknown Speaker  1:29  
Now, I've been here for about five, five years, between five and six years. And ever since I've been here, I looked at this

Unknown Speaker  1:40  
field, about a third of an acre probably that had never been used. And it was part of the allotment areas. So so I had an idea that that maybe we could put it to some good use

Unknown Speaker  1:56  
and have set up an allotment with the polytunnel with a large bulk polish,

Unknown Speaker  2:03  
which, which would include sustainability and growing food and nature. And there's a there's a whole raft of things, it just seemed to fit in a with the idea of setting it up. So, we did that, probably six months ago, I guess. And

Unknown Speaker  2:29  
one of the local trusts and the village had some money and they were looking to dispense some of it. So, I did some research and and put it to them that if we if we could set up this community based thing with with relevance to children, particularly children, and to get them into doing various things like peace eating nature and so on and so forth. So, so, I I looked at, I looked at what we could get for the money that they had available. So, I I searched this 40 foot by 40 foot

Unknown Speaker  3:17  
polytunnel,

Unknown Speaker  3:18  
which, which the trust agreed to, to fund it was 1400 pounds, which I didn't think was a huge amount of money, but

Unknown Speaker  3:29  
when it came,

Unknown Speaker  3:31  
we looked at it and thought oh my god, it's this is quite a big building and none of us had any experience and acting a polytunnels. I think the only the only experience I have had of polytunnels was was Jane's polytunnel in Scotland, but she uses for for producing all sorts of wonderful food. So anyway, we really started up with this eventually got the polytunnel out there, not easy direct, and we got a number of people on board who were of similar

Unknown Speaker  4:12  
thought to me had similar thoughts to me and some children. So we got them all together, started looking at the possibilities of doing various things. And so now, within the last few weeks, we've got the polytunnel up. It's almost full of raised beds. We have at least a dozen children who have come and planted in this morning planted onions and garlic and flowers. So and it's it's really taken off and we have the nature of the villages is such that there are a lot of elderly

Unknown Speaker  5:00  
People And sadly, we've lost a number over the past few months not through

Unknown Speaker  5:08  
COVID-19 but by just natural causes. So we had two or three of the

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widows as it was a who came and said, Would you consider doing something in commemoration of my husband, you see, so, so that's sort of gone on and we now have

Unknown Speaker  5:32  
an orchard being planted by by a sweet lady who, who lost her husband, a, we've got two benches, we have a pond, we have a beehive going in, probably

Unknown Speaker  5:46  
next week, and,

Unknown Speaker  5:50  
and nature is beginning to even in the short time that we've been doing this, nature has increased enormously. So we're, we're keeping, keeping a check on all the species that we see. We have a we have a Spanish teacher, my Spanish teacher, here is a an accomplished artist. So he's, he's, we take photograph, give him the give him the picture. And he paints and sketches. Whatever it is, beetle, or B. And then we're going to put up a huge noticeboard with all these different animals, birds,

Unknown Speaker  6:38  
rodents, whatever, so that people can can enjoy the area, but also

Unknown Speaker  6:46  
a bring some knowledge on how the natural world works. So yeah, very exciting, Jen. And we should be producing

Unknown Speaker  6:59  
vegetables in a few months time. Loads of flowers going in, and loads of cuttings. This time, of course. Now is your time. So yes, good.

Unknown Speaker  7:11  
Fantastic. So you've not been idle. But trying to catch some? A few few minutes to record a podcast has been a bit tricky, because of that project. But it's Yeah, it's lovely to see doing it dad, and you've you've really driven it from the start, which is great. Well done. And in, in this podcast, where we're going to head to Southeast Asia.

Unknown Speaker  7:37  
And Dad, dad had two postings in Hong Kong.

Unknown Speaker  7:41  
The first was in the late 50s, early 60s, and the second was in 86, and 1986 to 1988. So two very different times. But all during the British rule of the heart of Hong Kong, and British rule ran from 1841 through to 1997. So dad, we've done a podcast on Hong Kong and lab one. But you when when we were chatting beforehand, before recording this podcast, you said that there were some things that you'd remembered about your earlier posting there that when you were in the Air Force that you thought it was important to share. So I wonder if you could fill us in on what those points were?

Unknown Speaker  8:31  
Yes, sure. Yes. I think I think the last podcast we did on Hong Kong was gave us a sort of idea of what it was like, at that time, a to be in the services and to do an exotic

Unknown Speaker  8:51  
posting like like Hong Kong, because most most of us were young and had just left university or left school. So it was quite an eye opener. And what I found when we first went there was that the levels of poverty a in the late 50s

Unknown Speaker  9:16  
I just couldn't believe it because having come from a

Unknown Speaker  9:20  
you know, quite an affluent society, not rich but certainly we had plenty of food inside. And I can remember the first the first trip we had to make because where we were billeted and where we worked were about 50 miles apart.

Unknown Speaker  9:40  
So we used to have to a travelled through a town by the name of UN long village called Captain to get to work. And the first I can remember the first journey was such an eye opener. They had it was very, very

Unknown Speaker  10:00  
Dirty town it was poor, out of poverty, a lot of deprivation. And we, we drove through this, this town. And the first thing we noticed was an old lady

Unknown Speaker  10:18  
lying wrapped up and old pieces of carpet, lying on their, on the raised area between the two roads. And we asked the driver what, what's happening and this driver says, or don't go near her, she's she's bad news. And they called her mad Mary, she was very, very large Chinese lady who used to cost people in the street and demand money. And she, she would do that. And she'd been doing it for about 20 years, I believe. And, and she would sleep on the, on the

Unknown Speaker  11:03  
piece of ground between the two roads, all wrapped up. And, and people would shout out there and, you know, they didn't really want her there. But, but even in the Old Village of cam turn, where some of our servants came from a it was it was desperately poor. I mean, it was just incredibly poor and the number of children that were there, and it was a sort of sealed off area.

Unknown Speaker  11:34  
So we didn't we would advise not not to go inside and have a look around. But of course, with working with or having some of the people who lived there looking after us, and in the village and so on, we picked up quite a lot of information. And one of one of the one of the a man who, who worked for us, we called him Diane j because they had lost an eye and Diane Jaya is what I didn't, Cantonese. And he, he was incredibly thin. And we we sort of used to try to look after him saying the other one who are

Unknown Speaker  12:20  
for us was was less so he was brought organised and so on. But you could see the children

Unknown Speaker  12:28  
when they sometimes they brought their children with them, they were

Unknown Speaker  12:32  
a mess eaters and, and had all sorts of ailments. And it was really, really sad. But

Unknown Speaker  12:42  
on the other side, our work

Unknown Speaker  12:46  
was to do China many, of course, China at that time was was had such a huge population, a not enough food to feed everyone. And they had a medical system that didn't actually work. And it was communist. So a lot of the the inhabitants of various cities and in China wanted to escape a naturally because I couldn't get enough food, it was a very, very rigorous

Unknown Speaker  13:24  
atmosphere, the whole thing. So they used to swim over to to Hong Kong, and try and escape. That way. Of course, the

Unknown Speaker  13:37  
direction finding a hat that we had was was right, a opposite the closest part of China. So we had people swimming across some of them. And

Unknown Speaker  13:51  
you know, even even walking along the beach, you would find a dead body sometimes. And it was it was particularly sad. But it's it's interesting to think that in the late 50s, China were looked upon China was looked upon as a, as a big enough thread to be monitoring what they were doing. The movement of ships, the commerce, their ability to to

Unknown Speaker  14:26  
protect their their own country, the the armaments that were making the the early signs of rockets being being made, and so on and so forth.

Unknown Speaker  14:39  
So we were

Unknown Speaker  14:42  
cooperating with the Australians with a bigger station, which was also in Hong Kong, and one or two other smaller places around that area. And what we were trying to do

Unknown Speaker  14:59  
was keep

Unknown Speaker  15:00  
tabs on the size of the fleet that the Chinese had, a, their movements so that we knew exactly where they were and what they were doing. And also their ability to produce

Unknown Speaker  15:15  
the sort of industry that would, that would provide more shipping more destroyers and so on and so forth. So it was, it was fairly basic, because they're the communications, of course, they had no satellite communications in those days. So they had to resort to

Unknown Speaker  15:39  
wireless and transmissions that were, that were

Unknown Speaker  15:44  
audible so that, that if you were in the right place, you could you could listen to them, if a with a view to, to decoding, what they were sending, but also to be able to take a direction, finding

Unknown Speaker  16:03  
measurement and find out where they were. Now, at the time, we were in Hong Kong, there's another two posts doing similar things in Australia. And there was another one, I think it was in, I think it was in Taiwan, but I couldn't be hundred percent sure on that. So, if if someone say and Australia

Unknown Speaker  16:29  
monitored a transmission from a ship, say

Unknown Speaker  16:35  
that was of interest, then they had to inform the network of surveillance stations like ours, and so on this OSI one and Hong Kong was what was what was used by them to, to transmit information to us so that we could, we could locate the frequency that the activity was on, and, and take a take an hf

Unknown Speaker  17:06  
bearing on it. So if all the stations that were involved in the network did that, that would almost exactly pinpoint the the actual location of the of the ship if it was a ship.

Unknown Speaker  17:21  
So it worked in that way. But it wasn't as easy as that, because in that information that we were receiving, had to be encrypted.

Unknown Speaker  17:31  
And had to be landline. Because if you were transmitting that as a signal through the air, then obviously the Chinese could monitor that and make a connection between the activity from the ship and

Unknown Speaker  17:48  
our, our activity and in

Unknown Speaker  17:52  
in providing information about the target. So so we everything had to be a deadly serious. So we use landlines for that so that you couldn't monitor that or the Chinese or other hostile countries couldn't monitor it. So it was all very closed in and

Unknown Speaker  18:13  
it was quite, I suppose you could say primitive in the sense that when you compare it now with with what facilities they have, but But the other thing was an a social dimension. A fair we were we lived in

Unknown Speaker  18:35  
an account, at SATCOM. We had a mixture of people who had the Royal Tank Regiment. We had Gurkhas

Unknown Speaker  18:44  
and it was quite close to two, I suppose you could say

Unknown Speaker  18:51  
places where uprisings took place now and again because because with the British being there and so on, there were a lot of

Unknown Speaker  19:01  
Chinese like to set up trouble, whatever occurred. So we had these fairly regularly, and demonstrations and, and a lot of damage was done during that time. So the Gurkhas were the tough guys who had to go and, and sorta demonstrations. And

Unknown Speaker  19:24  
that was really scary because we used to, we used to get the information at pass it on to the bigger

Unknown Speaker  19:34  
control.

Unknown Speaker  19:36  
And they would set off maybe 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 workers and no one knew

Unknown Speaker  19:44  
what was going to happen because it was so it was so reckless and so tough with the cookies. And I remember one incident when I think 14 of the demonstrators were were killed before anyone could stop the Gurkhas

Unknown Speaker  20:00  
So it was quite, quite ferocious.

Unknown Speaker  20:03  
But yeah, so getting back to the, to the present, if you, if you,

Unknown Speaker  20:12  
you know, consider how we did things in those days, and how, how low tech,

Unknown Speaker  20:20  
the various countries were, in terms of communication, so did what is happening now, a with with satellites, and so on and so forth. It's, it's, there's so, so much as happened. And I think in future podcasts, what we will do is try and make some sense of that huge development and in communications and satellite communication, and what effect that has an and country's remaining as safe as we can. And, but it's happening at such a pace, there's so many things that are going on now, that that that with, with money and technology, and, and the fact that so many countries are trying to develop systems that that are

Unknown Speaker  21:24  
inviolable, like

Unknown Speaker  21:29  
drones, I mean, drones are incredible

Unknown Speaker  21:33  
instruments of war that can be controlled by satellite communication, and so on. So So basically, a comparing them with now, there's virtually nothing that that

Unknown Speaker  21:48  
around that you could set up that would intercept some of those commute communications unless you had a huge satellite antenna. So it's changed dramatically. And also, because because you don't have to be

Unknown Speaker  22:07  
in a close to the country that have, you haven't dressed in a, because if you have a site somewhere, like in the middle of Australia, like in America, like throughout Europe, where you can see satellites, and you have a clear view, from satellites, if you have the technology, and and you can record and store the information, the data that's being transmitted in those vehicles, then you have a much better chance of being able to, to crack the code lie and find out exactly what the strategic importance is of some of these links that they have created.

Unknown Speaker  22:54  
And that going back to the 19, late 1950s, early 1960s, how advanced were the Chinese in listening in return? So how did they do that? Did they do it by radio? Did they do it physically? Did you? Did you have people on the ground observing you you were based very close to the border? Did you have people observing you How did they listen? in inverted commas to you? Yeah, very, it was very similar to what we were doing it what the Allies were doing. And they had the benefit of having a vast country that they could, they could use. And they did that. I mean, they they used to, it would set up something in the south of China to monitor what we were doing in Hong Kong, for example, because they would always very interested in that. And they've always had their eye on Hong Kong, of course, but Taiwan and so and so all their stations were were established in such places, they keep an eye on any developments, just like us, just like we were doing any movement of tubes, any connection say with the Americans that was very important to them. Even in those days, there was

Unknown Speaker  24:23  
you know, travel between the two the two countries so, so they were doing precisely that except that they were they had

Unknown Speaker  24:32  
they had other things in mind they wanted to, to to

Unknown Speaker  24:38  
if the code and next any countries or or large areas around China, which would give them the ability to grow food and survive. So their base if you like, it was huge. It could have could have a station every 500 miles or so.

Unknown Speaker  25:00  
In China, so they didn't have to use other countries as basis, they could keep an eye on, on troop movements on on

Unknown Speaker  25:11  
aircraft carrier movements and so on and so forth from within the safety of their own countries. So there was a difference there.

Unknown Speaker  25:19  
Yeah, amazing. And if you fast forward, so, you know, you were you were there in that early, early 60s era, late 50s, early 60s, and then you were there some decades later, from 86 to 88. How did what you were doing, when you were with the Air Force in those early years and then when you had joined gch q in the 80s? How did your

Unknown Speaker  25:50  
intent your focus change over the years was it still the same was it about listening to China or had your involvement in the region changed and if it had, how,

Unknown Speaker  26:04  
I think it is obviously changed that sense that

Unknown Speaker  26:09  
monitoring satellite communications

Unknown Speaker  26:13  
obviously, brought in huge amount of data. So it was very high tech, everything is high tech, and whereas, in the 1950s 1960s, we were sitting in a hut

Unknown Speaker  26:27  
perhaps eight feet by eight feet, listening to two very bad Morse a from from various targets in a smoky atmosphere, sometimes miles and miles away from from any other

Unknown Speaker  26:45  
establishment.

Unknown Speaker  26:47  
Whereas, in, in the satellite, here, it was totally different. It was like being in a huge, and a huge, high tech environment where everything was, was clean and and sanitised and, and huge pieces of equipment, with with with data screens, and so on.

Unknown Speaker  27:11  
And a, in a situation like that you didn't acquire nearly the number of people that you will reach in, in communications when frequencies hf frequencies were being used. So So generally speaking, there'd be more space between an environment a, and some of them, you want to load small, because because it might,

Unknown Speaker  27:38  
it might affect the sensitive equipment. And there were

Unknown Speaker  27:44  
there were huge banks of computers, processing the data. And it was, it was just a totally different environment. And I think I think as years went on it because of the progress of computers, when it became a more efficient and

Unknown Speaker  28:09  
more powerful. The that was a trend. We didn't need the space so much because the equipment was was smaller and did more work. And then it became

Unknown Speaker  28:22  
pardon me, it became a

Unknown Speaker  28:25  
became a difficulty with some some of the postings a like in Hong Kong was

Unknown Speaker  28:35  
air conditioning because you had to keep the equipment cool. And of course that in a hot climate that was not very easy. So you'd have you'd have the background hum of air conditioners and a filtered filtered air and neon light and and probably a 10th the number of people that the tier two for you would have had says sir, it was a different environment altogether.

Unknown Speaker  29:05  
And you were a very different era, as well. And when you say 1988 you're less than a decade when you left Hong Kong for a second time. You were less than a decade away from Hong Kong going back to the Chinese. How did that change the dynamics of Hong Kong? From an intelligence point of view? And also how welcome were British diplomats and British intelligence during that 86 to 80 1988 era?

Unknown Speaker  29:40  
Yeah, I mean that that the result has been friction between

Unknown Speaker  29:45  
China and Hong Kong, because chain Chinese always thought that Tong Gong should have been ruled by them. And of course the fact that that there were so many

Unknown Speaker  29:57  
Europeans Brits in between

Unknown Speaker  30:00  
killer in, in Hong Kong was always an issue. And when

Unknown Speaker  30:05  
Patton was was governor, of course, he had to negotiate the, the clause that that allowed us to, to hold on to Hong Kong, but we had to accept certain things that the Chinese wanted to do. And of course, from the Chinese point of view, Hong Kong was was a was a centre of commerce.

Unknown Speaker  30:29  
Better excellent facilities it had, it had a brand new

Unknown Speaker  30:34  
airport, which which

Unknown Speaker  30:37  
was built in the C a tad a, you know, it's at all the technology attend a lot of the financial institutions like HSBC, and in Hong Kong, so so it was surprised that they they would have used to, to inject some pace into their on economic expansion, which was, which was substantial. So it's always been, it's always been that way. And I think, I think,

Unknown Speaker  31:08  
I mean, further, you

Unknown Speaker  31:11  
applaud China, from the way they've done what they have done. And they've more or less reached the goals that they wanted to reach, or still are still, some, some are not realised yet. But a they've done it without, without fighting wars, and it's something that we forget, I mean, apart from skirmishes around

Unknown Speaker  31:35  
around Pakistan, and so on Manchuria, a Mongolia and Taiwan, South Korea, they really have not had any huge wars, like, like some of the European nations, so so they have prospered in that, in that respect. And, and even with, with the Hong Kong situation now.

Unknown Speaker  32:01  
I mean, I don't think with with, with a communist

Unknown Speaker  32:05  
government, that there's very much we can do. I mean, you can you can protest and weekers, a incarceration and these big camps, they're building a, you know, we can all say what we think the United Nations and various various political bodies can criticise, and say, Oh, it's here. It's, it's awful, you're in terms of human rights and so on. But the Chinese don't care. They just do what they have to do. And the repercussions have become so in effect, you Oh, that, that. They just, they just keep on doing what they're doing. But like, unlike some other countries who have a lot of bluff and bluster a, and don't work together, the Chinese have different a different philosophy. They move into areas and take control. They don't negotiate. They just they just like in Tibet, like they can Pakistan. And they just, they just walk in, and the takeover. And it's partly to do with the mass of

Unknown Speaker  33:24  
people moving and and nmdc like Tibet, it starts with a dribble and it becomes a flood and then it becomes Well, they're just, you know, so many of them, you might as well call it Chinese nothing. I think that is a that is a process that is is happening now. And

Unknown Speaker  33:47  
I think in

Unknown Speaker  33:51  
the future, I don't see any way that much can be done about that. Because no one's going to take China on and

Unknown Speaker  34:00  
create another world war or something, I think, I think they're just so canny now and they've got so much of the power base in terms of commodities and materials, and that you've done that quietly

Unknown Speaker  34:15  
and surreptitiously. And some and some,

Unknown Speaker  34:20  
in some ways, legal, others illegal. But when you listen to the some of the African nations, it's a mixed message you get when questions that are asked about China, but one thing you can't blame them for is is

Unknown Speaker  34:38  
not improving the areas that they moved into. And even though it's it's all qualified people now in Africa, so yeah, they gave us a job, not very well paid, but but they've it keeps us going, you know, so it's a very, it's a very delicate balance that we have have just now and I think a lot of the intelligence community

Unknown Speaker  35:00  
scratching their head said they're not quite sure where to go. I mean, in terms of, of

Unknown Speaker  35:10  
the internet and so on, it's such a powerful thing. They I think the Chinese and South Koreans

Unknown Speaker  35:20  
URL advanced in that, and they're using it intelligently whereas all above and bluffing,

Unknown Speaker  35:28  
boasting and so on of America and of Europe there so. So you're a, you know, we should be looking at those systems that the Chinese are setting up that allow them to subjugate countries and nations and to control what's happening just by the fact that they listen, and they have the technology. I can Huawei if that's if that's a legitimate claim, to, to monitor to monitor what people are doing and to some extent, to, to affect the outcome of some of the big problems.

Unknown Speaker  36:10  
Yes, surgery dead. And I think that the complexity of many nations relationships with with China now, has has been exacerbated by the COVID. situation, you've got all sorts of

Unknown Speaker  36:28  
country to country. difficulties, like, for example, between China and Australia, between ourselves and China linked to Huawei, between the US and China. And they seem to have been exacerbated by the power shift and the complexities of the covid pandemic. What are your reflections on that dad?

Unknown Speaker  36:54  
Yeah, I think I think that's the case. I mean, I think, you know, the start of the covid 19 epidemic

Unknown Speaker  37:03  
has been well publicised by, by Donald Trump

Unknown Speaker  37:09  
by calling it a Chinese virus. But I mean, in terms of that, where it really originated. I mean, there's no way that that with such a big population in those countries, Vietnam was the same China, Laos, the, you know, they have meat markets, and because there's poverty in those countries, perhaps not so much. In China. They're the eternal thing. And it's a survival thing. And you know, that, that

Unknown Speaker  37:44  
the proximity of animals and, and human beings in the same and the same market cutting, cutting bits of various animals and lack of hygiene and so on. I mean, it's, it's, I don't think there's a lot that can be done about that. And I think, too, that the backdrop to that in places like China is that they're there. I mean, the systems are probably something that they've got to look at some point but but they have such technology and such

Unknown Speaker  38:22  
persistence, and and looking for cures, and so on, that they can't be a brushed aside. I mean, we need them we need them to cooperate and finding solutions for these viruses that afflict us.

Unknown Speaker  38:38  
So it's an interesting era ahead of us, I think, yeah, their power is certainly going to grow isn't that on every level medical engineering, technological?

Unknown Speaker  38:51  
Even things like democracy and world world trade, you know, they they, they are mighty.

Unknown Speaker  38:58  
And they are absolutely embedded now in the global economy. So we're going to have to find ways to work with China and not without them. Yes, that's that's exactly what I've, I feel too, and I think that

Unknown Speaker  39:13  
we're going to have to suffer their political

Unknown Speaker  39:19  
arrangements. In the meantime, there's not a lot we can do. Because, I mean, you can't suddenly say, Oh, you can't do that, that you know that you can contravening human rights. And so, because they'll do what they have to do. So we have, we have to find ways of negotiating with them. I mean, a lot of that's happening. If you talk to some of the some of the people who are now

Unknown Speaker  39:43  
you know, doing wonderful things and such things as nuclear fusion and in medicine, they do have a fantastic cooperation with the Chinese. I mean, the Chinese

Unknown Speaker  40:00  
deeply embedded in American

Unknown Speaker  40:04  
culture, you know, there are millions of Chinese there who who have been working diligently and in different areas. And I mean, they're there. And so you can point your finger at China into this, because there's so much part of the developing world

Unknown Speaker  40:23  
that we have to find ways of working with, not against them.

Unknown Speaker  40:29  
Yeah, that's so true. But the human rights issue is, is a very live one, isn't it? And it's over the last six months is it's it's become quite a tragic situation,

Unknown Speaker  40:43  
especially amongst the young citizens of Hong Kong that wants sea change. And they're basically getting squashed for any protests, whether they're peaceful or not. They're getting squashed for trying to have a have their say. And for behaving as if the country is still a democracy, which clearly it isn't. Yeah, that's I mean, he just happened to be the battleground for that clash and cultures. Free Enterprise and the Chinese are a but I mean, I think in some ways, I don't know, if you feel the same that there are changes and in

Unknown Speaker  41:21  
China, that there's a quite a quite make things more optimistic than otherwise would have been the case. I mean, some of the officials that they have listened to them talking and being interviewed, and they do sound, I think, a little bit freer, but

Unknown Speaker  41:40  
at the same time, you wonder how much they're concealing, about the way they organised themselves? And like I say, the weekers are?

Unknown Speaker  41:50  
I mean, I can't deny that them not doing some, some really

Unknown Speaker  41:57  
objectionable things, you know, they're, they're trying to re educate them, and trying to get them to give up the culture and things like that. Because for China, that's what they do. You know?

Unknown Speaker  42:11  
Yeah. It's an authoritarian, authoritarian state, isn't it? Yes. Yes. And it's something that we can't comprehend in, in the, you know, democracies that we live in. It's just as an anathema to us. Yes.

Unknown Speaker  42:29  
And, and at the moment, so we say 1997, we, we walked away from Hong Kong, there were promises made by China.

Unknown Speaker  42:40  
And but there's still that the legacy of that relationship between Hong Kong and Britain, and it's an uncomfortable one for both countries.

Unknown Speaker  42:51  
And and probably its most uncomfortable for China, because there's been posturing recently from the British government that they will take people who want to flee Hong Kong, they will we will take them into Britain. How do you think the security services gch Q. Mr. Six, and also the diplomatic service will be viewing those kinds of promises from the British government?

Unknown Speaker  43:21  
Well, I have to say that I mean, a lot of the rhetoric here and with respect to Hong Kong, is is posturing, it doesn't mean anything. And I think that that has happened frequently in the past, and Hong Kong, doesn't matter what you say, and what chords you threaten a country with China will do what they want to do. And I think, I think that the demonstrations in Hong Kong, were unfortunate.

Unknown Speaker  43:53  
But you could see that they were crossing the line when they started a burning buildings and so on. And I think, I think the puppet that China had in Hong Kong, a name escapes me, but she she

Unknown Speaker  44:12  
she wasn't strong enough. And neither did she have enough ammunition to fight what China were trying to do, which is re annex the island of Hong Kong.

Unknown Speaker  44:27  
Yeah. Carrie Lam was in the battery alarm? That's right.

Unknown Speaker  44:31  
Yeah, I mean, the fact that they did they call her the chief executive of Hong Kong. I mean, that says it all she's not the not the President, not the Prime Minister. She's the chief executive. Yes. So she has an executive role that that is, that is very much LED

Unknown Speaker  44:49  
and orchestrated by the Chinese government. Yes. Yes. In your business.

Unknown Speaker  44:57  
World, Jane, do you have any

Unknown Speaker  45:00  
dealings with with the Chinese?

Unknown Speaker  45:03  
No Dad, I mean, I've I've come across. So working in agriculture, I have come across a number of businesses that are active in China in the agricultural sphere. And they are really, really progressive. You know, they're they're trying to ramp up production in their country, as we all know. And that's through the acquisition of land offshore. Yeah. It's the acquisition of skills. And it's, it's also they've been, the people that I've met have been amazingly entrepreneurial, and almost a bit like magpies going around the world, trying to find out the best ways to run dairy farms, for example.

Unknown Speaker  45:50  
And the investment that's going into their agricultural infrastructure is quite, quite exceptional.

Unknown Speaker  45:57  
And so some of the carrot and stick with which we've been able to negotiate with China, you know, like, for example, they need food and they need animal feed. Well, if they get to a point where they're producing a lot of it themselves, then actually that that need to trade with other parts of the world to to get the food and feed they need is diminished. Yes. And that makes, you know, that adds complexity to the, to the discussions, trade discussions.

Unknown Speaker  46:30  
Yeah, that's interesting that that is interesting. Of course, this. I mean, the pundits now are saying that it's only a matter of time, before America and China and Chinese, a position where they could start attacking each other. But I personally don't think that would happen, because I think the Chinese are too canny to commit themselves like that. They have other means of,

Unknown Speaker  47:01  
of ensuring that they, their basis remains a powerful base. And I think, the grassfire in Europe now, in America in particular, I mean, all the posturing that goes on and and the threads

Unknown Speaker  47:16  
won't work. I don't think it will, they will work. And I think that unless we all start pulling together and formulating some different way of negotiating with China in particular, I think it'll just stay as it is, and bad tempered, skirmishes here and there and people threatening to attack other people. So I think

Unknown Speaker  47:42  
until we start changing our own political systems in the West, that, you know, we don't we don't get that. Much like, doing favourable business with the Chinese.

Unknown Speaker  47:58  
No, no, I think you're right, that. Well, it's been, it's been absolutely fascinating. It's some it's now nearly half past six on a Sunday evening. And I suspect you haven't had anything to eat yet. You're right. This ribeye tonight, Jim. Wow. Supporting the British beef industry. Yeah, it's fantastic. I need I need, you know, my age now. Because today for played tennis, I've done some physical work have

Unknown Speaker  48:27  
done various things. And you need protein, and ribeye, I think is one of the best ones. But I don't eat a ribeye steak all at once. I have it and have one, one half one day and one half the following day. Wow. That's just you're so good at looking after your health. And

Unknown Speaker  48:49  
I'm not going to say how old you are. But can you tell our listeners how old you are? Yeah, but I've got there's no forget at 2am. So a an interesting the idea of some some I do two sessions of exercise every week, about 14 minutes of a tough South African guy in squash courts. And we do yeah, 40 minutes of waiting so and and the benefits I feel from that are enormous, not not just physical, but mental. And I find that if I have plenty of things to think about to do and projects and and so on.

Unknown Speaker  49:35  
That's a way to keep yourself not necessarily young, but but but younger, I think and and I like it, so that's what I'm gonna do for the rest of my

Unknown Speaker  49:47  
two years.

Unknown Speaker  49:50  
Your next your next 20 years that we're gonna, we're gonna get up to 100 plus podcasts.

Unknown Speaker  49:58  
See majan that, wouldn't it

Unknown Speaker  50:00  
doing stuff. But you know that are some people know that you see being interviewed. And, you know,

Unknown Speaker  50:08  
it's pandemic that that's happening incredible, but they're doing 101 and two and three was amazing. I was listening, I think I've sent your link and we'll we'll end on this. But

Unknown Speaker  50:22  
I sent you a link to the declassified podcast which was set up I think, for people living leaving the military. And just to give them you know, sort of ideas about what they can do when they get to civvy Street. But one of the one of the recordings, which is rerun, from the day was an interview with a

Unknown Speaker  50:45  
with a guy called Dennis Brock, who had fought in the Second World War. What an amazing man, he not once did he talk of his suffering, everything about the way he taught was positive and,

Unknown Speaker  50:59  
you know, reflective, and this guy was still bell ringing at the age of 100. And I think he was 101 when they interviewed him if he wasn't, he was he was very, very close to 100,000. But it's well, it's well worth anybody listening. It was so humbling to listen to him. Yes.

Unknown Speaker  51:21  
That's incredible. Yeah, but anyway, Dad, I'll leave you to your ribeye steak. Enjoy it. I wish I was wish I was eating it with you. Yeah, that'd be lovely. But it won't be too long. I guess when we can get together and at least we can communicate by whatever WhatsApp zoom and other platforms. Exactly. Exactly. Well, thank you ever so much, dad. And next time I think we will travel to back to Turkey. Yeah. Just before the first Gulf War. Yes, we love Turkey. Don't worry. We do. Yeah, my favourite country. All right, dad. Well, thank you ever so much. Thank you, Jenny.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai