Troubling

The large scale violence that occurred Friday night (this morning our time) is very troubling, see ESWN's translation of Chinese reports. (Though for some reason, those bloody photos don't look real to me. Why does everybody's blood form the same pattern?) Given the other, small attack against a mainland official only two weeks ago, I was puzzled that the leaders on both sides of the Taiwan Straits would be in such a hurry to meet again. They seemed to be carried away by the concept of an "historical moment." Ancient Chinese wisdom stresses three favorable factors for any successful political action, namely "heaven's timing, earth's terrain, and human unity" (天时，地利，人和). Lacking any one of the three factors can lead to failure, yet it seems to me none is favorable for the current meeting. The violence two weeks agao has already signaled that neither the timing nor the place is right. The human unity? It seems even further off on this issue. The leaders need to study our ancient strategists a bit more.