[ramblenode]

Unlike many commenters here, I actually read the article, and this quote seems to be the basis for the tenuous link between archeaology and geopolitics suggested by the title:

> The extent to which present-day politics hovers over China’s archaeological ambitions became clear during a Wall Street Journal reporter’s encounter with an Uzbek researcher at the ruins of an ancient Kushan city near Chinor. “Tell the Chinese that they will not find any traces of the Chinese here,” he said.

Kind of an interesting story if you can look past the attempt by WSJ to shoehorn in a geopolitcal angle.

> Asked whether Beijing could use the Yuezhi to make territorial claims, Wang said the notion was absurd because the nomads are a historical people and no one serious would put forth that argument.

"We're just asking questions", etc.

[beloch]

Archaeology does not take place in a vacuum. It has always been a product of political human beings. Archaeologists are keenly aware of this. Mussolini excavated Pompeii with bulldozers to reveal the past greatness of Italy on a schedule compatible with his ambitions. British archaeologists conducted digs around the globe through the lens of empire. Natives in the Americas, to this day, hesitate to trust archaeologists because they have, far too often, ignored the culture and concerns of descendants while digging up their ancestors. Most archaeologists strive to tell the truth, but truth is often a matter of perspective.

It's not being anti-Chinese to observe that China is currently an expansionist totalitarian state, and that Chinese archaeologists will be under pressure to support a state-approved narrative. Their research should be viewed with their cultural context firmly in mind.

[peterfirefly]

> hesitate to trust archaeologists because they have, far too often, ignored the culture and concerns of descendants while digging up their ancestors.

Or more likely: because they have, far too often, proved the natives wrong and also shown that the people the natives called ancestors weren't... or, if they were, they were also the ancestors of those terrible people from the Evil Enemy Tribe that Nobody Likes.

Natives have political agendas, too.

[BurningFrog]

Part of recognizing the full and equal humanity of indigenous peoples is to accept that they're just as greedy, deceitful, and chauvinistic as the rest of us.

[nuc1e0n]

What a fabulous comment. I'd upvote it twice if I could. These kind of issues of cultural identity over time are one of the topics in Frank Herbert's Dune series.

[throwaway48476]

Their political history also included a lot of slavery.

[peterfirefly]

Slavery was and is depressingly common -- and has very little to do with skin colour. Sad that so many "educated" Americans think otherwise :(

"Can we get enslave those guys over there? Is the cost/benefit analysis in our favour, at least for the short term? And there are no (incredibly strong!) social taboos against it? Then let's go ahead and do it!"

The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.

[nuc1e0n]

Yep. They also did partial reconstuction work of the great wall in modern times and passed it off as ancient. Similarly, Stonehenge in the UK was also partially reconstructed in the 20th century.

Sensoji temple in Tokyo was also rebuilt to its original design in the 1950s.

The giant stone Buddhas of Afganistan could do with reconstructing IMHO as well.

[aragonite]

> Yep. They also did partial reconstuction work of the great wall in modern times and passed it off as ancient.

Do you have a source for "and passed it off as ancient"?

[nuc1e0n]

Not off the top of my head, but a lot of the misleading is done through omission, for which there is no source obviously. The stretch near Beijing gets a lot of tourists and by default they're led to believe they're walking on an ancient wonder. I think it's not made clear enough any of it was rebuilt in modern times, let alone which bits were. But also many historical buildings have been rebuilt multiple times over a long period of history.

With Sensoji, which pieces of wood represent the temple? It's a sort of ship of Theseus situation in any case.

Modern history is still history, and also forms part of the story to be told.

[ngcc_hk]

The difference is when the Brits collected, it is not to prove Brits were there and we are all Brits. Also china is 1/5 of humanity. It is of different scale when it goes rogue.

One day Soviet Union or Russia will remember the if china can claim Mongolian empire theirs and it reached Moscow …

But if chinese really studied its own history, its history are full of expansion then totally collapse. Anything went into the core land collapsed in it no doubt. But the core is not stable. There is no political solution to solve an empire which abhor difference and only use exam to do social cohesion and inclusion.

[throwaway48476]

Don't expect them to unravel the mystery of the tocharians.

[namaria]

> truth is often a matter of perspective.

This is nonsense. Truth is patently objective. Narratives fail to get at truth, but that doesn't change the nature of truth.

[Leary]

Exactly, the Yuezhi is about as Chinese as the Japanese are, both first entering into the historical records in official Chinese dynastic history during the Han Dynasty.