China's charm offensive

China's honing of its soft power strategy transforms the world as its gains influence on the international stage.
……… The Chinese government had done a great deal of preparatory work for this visit. They had invested a lot of money in language schools and cultural programs in Cambodia, built a kind of Peace Corps program there, gave out scholarships for children who would go on to study in China, and created a huge aid program. ……… Now you have 110,000-140,000 overseas students in China. (Some, of course, are students who probably would have liked to study in the US but visas have become more difficult to obtain since 9/11.)[View Full Article]