Fight the common foe

Re: “China replies”, (PostBag, March 25).

It was inevitable that the Chinese embassy would respond to US Ambassador Michael DeSombre’s lengthy attack on March 21 (“Don’t believe lies”). It would be a good idea to let the quarrel between the two superpowers end there. What is necessary now is for both countries to unite in the war against their common enemy, the coronavirus.

Chinese culture has a popular aphorism, Tian xia wei gong. This translates (roughly) as “Under heaven, one commonwealth”. In these troubling times, we need a guiding principle that will bring us even closer together than a commonwealth. A slight change in wording ought to do the trick: Tian xia yi jia. (“Under heaven, one family”). In English, this might be expressed as “We’re all in this together”.

Let’s keep that in mind and focus all of our energy on defeating the coronavirus together and put an end to petty quarrelling.

S TSOW