Chinese government diplomacy and rhetorics

I love articles like these.  Chinese Premier Li told Japanese Foreign Minister Kishida that the Japanese side should stick to the path of peaceful development, and match deeds with its words that China's peaceful development is an opportunity.

This is a rhetorical game the Chinese government plays every single time it is possible: it relies on the ignorance of most people about China's current power, and on the strong memory of the Japanese occupation of Chinese territories. Never mind that the occupation was more than 70 years ago, by a different political system that does not exists in Japan anymore, and that subsequent governments have apologized for it several times. Most people don't know these things and the Chinese PR specialists understand and use this fact to bend the truth the way it suits their bosses best.
Think also of the adjective 'peaceful'. China is one of the few countries which has actually annexed other independent countries and territories to itself since WWII. Tibet, the North-Eastern territories, and some other smaller areas are occupied by it. It is rapidly building military centers in the South-China Sea, it opposes the independence of Taiwan, and is already attacking all democratic institutions on Hong Kong. China's military spending now is second after the US, and has been continuously rising year by year. It is developing its own fighter jets, aircraft carriers, tanks, special advanced weapon systems, and has the capacity to destroy orbiting satellites. The government suppresses thousands of protests every year. It is still regular in China for people to disappear, to be bullied and even imprisoned for having different views from high ranking party members. This country claims to be peaceful.

The funniest bit is that the Chinese government's members and puppets always accuse Japan of aggression. While Japan committed war crimes during WWII, and did occupy several countries, it lost the war, was occupied for seven years itself, and has since been one of the most peaceful countries in the world, only maintaining self-defence forces until last summer. No countries invaded.

Successive Japanese governments, private people, researchers, and public figures have apologized several times for the crimes committed by a long ago gone Japanese government and a long ago gone army. Japan invested heavily in the rebuilding of China, and much of China's industrial capacity and economic ability has to be thanked for to Japan.

Just two further things to notice: I think Japan, and everyone else whose money China is growing on - Europe, the US, Australia, etc. - do see opportunity in the peaceful growth of China. But nobody sees an opportunity in the growth of an aggressive bully. This will of course hit worst the normal, working average Chinese citizens: their government is gambling with their security and good lives. The average person in China is like anywhere else: they care about job security, family, kids, education, health, friends, fun, and so on. The Chinese government is the culprit and has to be checked by collective action, now.

In light of all this, I don't think a single word of the Chinese government can be taken to mean literally what it does. The call for respect and peacefulness is basically a threat. A threat, that if other countries don't comply with their demands they will push in non-peaceful ways. This has to be seen as a real issue and treated as such.