Preface

• based on my observations and interactions with various people over the course of the last 50 years in government, during which I managed Singapore’s foreign policy and met many key figures who had first-hand experience dealing with the global issues of the day.
• Singapore has to take the world as it is; it is too small to change it.
• nimble and resourceful

1. China — A strong centre

• Increasingly, Chinese officials are exposed to Western education, familiar with the world, and fluent in English. They are no longer communists in the strict sense of the word, but pragmatists who are determined to forge a rich, developed and technologically advanced country.
• He believed in keeping your light under your bushel, or what the Chinese call tao guang yang hui.
• Reunification between Taiwan and the Mainland is a matter of time. No country can prevent it.
• Do not choose between them.

2. America — Troubled but still on top

• In this changing environment, Singapore’s overall strategy is to make sure that even as we latch on to the remarkable Chinese growth engine, we do not cut our lines to the rest of the world, including–and especially–to America.
• even as we grow our ties with the Chinese, they will not be able to stop us from maintaining strong economic, social, cultural and security ties with America.
• If the Chinese would like to make Singapore a port of call for its warships, as the Americans are doing, we will welcome them. But we will not choose sides by playing host to one and spurning the other. This is a stance we can continue to take for a very long time.
• Nearly five decades have elapsed and history has shown that the ability to speak English and to communicate with the world has turned out to be one of the most important factors in Singapore’s growth story.
• As China’s rise continues, Singapore might ramp up Chinese standards in our schools to give our students an advantage, should they choose to work or do business in China.
• we are a small country and a wrong course of action brings catastrophic consequences within a short space of time.
• China and other nations will eventually have to adopt parts of the American model of attracting talent to fit their circumstances. They will have to go looking around for talented people to build up their enterprises.
• One reason why China will always be a less effective magnet for talent is language. Chinese is a much harder language to learn than English. The spoken language is very difficult unless you learn it from a very young age.
• future in a world where wealth was generated not by making widgets or cars, but by brain power, imagination, artistry, knowledge and intellectual property.
• Our prosperity comes from linkages with the world.