Many Americans and other foreigners have remarked on the strong and friendly relationship developed between Saudi Arabia and the Republic of China. Common interest is involved, of course, but so is mutual respect. The two countries like what they see in each other. Dr. Thomas Paine, the president of Northrop Aircraft, recently visited both Jeddah and Taipei. The Saudis, he said, were deeply shocked by U.S. "normalization of relations" with the Chinese Communists and the severing of ties with the Republic of China. Saudi belief that trust should be based on friendship and character is reciprocated among the Chinese of Taiwan, the U.S. plane maker said.
Chinese Communist efforts to sidle up to Saudi Arabia have gotten nowhere. The Saudis respond that they want no part of Communism in general and Chinese Communism in particular. This is appropriate behavior for the custodians of Mecca. Islam has been persecuted with special ferocity on the Chinese mainland for the last 30 year. The mosques were closed and remain empty.
Friendship with Saudi Arabia has been misjudged by some as a free Chinese bid for oil.
There is no truth in such a supposition. The two countries entered into amicable relations before Saudi Arabia's great petroleum wealth was apparent. Since then, the Republic of China and Saudi Arabia have engaged in a succession of efforts to help each other. Technicians from Taiwan have been engaged in agricultural, power, road building and construction projects in Saudi Arabia. The Saudis have loaned money for Taiwan development and have given generously for the construction and support of mosques. China Airlines flies the Taipei-Jeddah route and carries many visiting dignitaries both ways as well as workers for the projects under way in Saudi Arabia.
Writing from Baha in the Middle Eastern kingdom, Bill Wang, a correspondent of the Central News Agency, said "A group of Taiwan Power Company workers carrying a 10-meter-Iong power pole struggle up a barren hill so the pole can be erected on the top as part of the effort to connect a nearby isolated village with the modern world. The sight would be nothing special were it not for the fact that it is taking place not in Taiwan but in the remote mountains of southern Saudi Arabia."
More than 1,300 Chinese are busily working in an area of 1,000 square kilometers around Baha, which is 400 kilometers southeast of Jeddah. They are building one of the kingdom's four major rural electrification projects to supply 180,000 members of 22,000 households with power. Many will be getting their first taste of what electricity means in assuring a better life.
Chien Ken, vice president of Taipower, said the Chinese had been brought 10,000 miles to Saudi Arabia by "sheer friendship. We have accepted the job because of our goodwill for the Saudi people."
As first projected, Baha electrification was to have been put out for international bids, as were three other electrification undertakings. Such countries as Britain, West Germany and Japan had conveyed the bids of interested companies. But the Saudi government felt the tenders were too high. Dr. Ghazi Gosaibi, minister of industry and electricity, was dispatched to Taipei in March, 1977, to see if Taipower would be interested. The Saudis had already seen technicians from Taiwan on the job and liked the good quality and reasonable cost.
President Chiang Ching-kuo, then Premier of the Republic of China, told Dr. Gosaibi that the free Chinese were prepared to work on Saudi projects even if that meant delaying their own major construction plans. A contract was signed in June, 1977, at Riyadh between Taipower and the state-owned Electricity Corporation of Saudi Arabia. Taipower agreed to build the project for US$153 million, less than 60 per cent of the lowest bid received from the interested developed countries. The Taiwan negotiators estimated that the company would lose US$20 million on the contract but reasoned that this would be a reasonable investment in goodwill.
Specifically, the contract called for building a power plant and transmission and distribution system within 32 months. Partial power was to be provided within 10 years. The power plant of two 5,000-kilowatt generators and five 10,000 kilowatt generators constituted no problem for Taipower. This is a relatively small installation. Distribution was a wholly different matter. It meant delivering the electricity to 22,000 house holds scattered across 1,000 square kilometers of hilly land at altitudes of from 2,000 to 2,500 meters.
In the initial stage, transmission lines had to be installed to connect the power plant with nine substations. This meant installing a 60 kilometer 132-kilovolt line and a 150-kilometer 33-kilovolt line. These were carried on 480 steel towers.
The line load will not be heavy in the initial stage. Power will be transmitted to the substations at 33 kilovolts. The lesser stations will be operated by radio signals from the control center at the main plant. Voltage will then be stepped down from 33,000 to 13,800 for local distribution.
Each household must be connected to a substation. This requires the installation of 1,000 kilometers of distribution lines of various specifications. Some 23,000 poles will be required to carry the transmission cables. More than 1,000 transformers will have to be mounted on the poles to step down the power to 220 or 127 volts for household use.
Taipower was not quite ready to take on the job when the contract was signed. The company is a generator of power and not a contractor working at limited levels. It had no experience in overseas projects. With the assistance of the New Asia Construction and Development Corporation, which undertook responsibility for civil construction, Taipower got the project under way in October of 1977.
Taipower engineers and workers were always confident they could get the job done. Wang Li-chai, deputy chief engineer for the project, said, "We decided that the project would be completed ahead of time so that thou sands of people could be benefited by electricity at the earliest possible date." The work schedule has been set up on a day and night basis. Without exception, everyone works three hours overtime every night.
As is almost always the case, hard work quickly paid off. The first phase of construction was completed last April. Two 5,000-kilowatt generators were ready to begin operation two months ahead of schedule. Not that difficulties do not lie ahead. The villages are the easiest to service and come first. But after that come remote households which will be harder to link to the power supply and assure of reliable service. Even so, Wang said that the whole project should be completed within this year a couple of months ahead of schedule.
Equal confidence is expressed by Ibrahim Atiyah, the jobsite representative of the Electricity Corporation. He will be responsible for the power plant when it is turned over to Saudi Arabia. Atiyah is of the opinion that Taipower will be able to carry out his pledges, and he hopes that the company will remain in Saudi Arabia to carry out additional projects.
Atiyah is a native of the area and has been impressed with the progress of Baha, which stands to become an important urban center in Saudi Arabia. An airport is nearing completion. Construction is under way on a 350-bed hospital. The plateau area will be connected with the Red Sea by highway. Agriculture is already well developed. Small industries are being opened up. Marble of high quality has been discovered in the area. "With a stable power supply, Baha can become a major regional center of Saudi Arabia," Atiyah said.
Working conditions in Saudi Arabia are not easy. The winter is brief and the summer is long. Temperatures reach into the 100s. Linemen from Taiwan are accustomed to high temperatures, even though at home the humidity is sometimes more punishing than the mercury's highs. They adjust well to the Saudi Arabian climate - better than the workers of temperate climates who require more air-conditioning and other perquisites. This has won the respect of Saudis, who do not think of their homeland as especially hot (until they go to cooler climes).
Members of the Ret-Ser (Retired Service men) Engineering Agency of the Re public of China have shown similar durability in the construction of several highways for the Saudi Arabian government, including one between Jeddah and the holy city of Mecca. Despite the burning sun, there have been few cases of heat prostration. The excellent medical care accorded the Chinese workers has been a factor in their health, and this has indirectly led to another aspect of the Sino-Saudi program of cooperation. Two of five new Saudi Arabian hospitals will be staffed by Chinese doctors, nurses and other medical personnel. The National Taiwan University Hospital, one of the ranking facilities in the Far East, will soon dispatch a mission to Saudi Arabia. Personnel already are undergoing specialized training. Some 700 others will be provided by the Taipei Municipal Health Bureau for the hospital. Specialists range from top-ranking medical practitioners to maintenance people.
Dr. Hamed Mutabagani and Chinese doctors at the New Jeddah Clinic serving the health needs of Saudi Arabia. (File photo).
Already open is the New Jeddah Clinic, a 109 bed private hospital manned 80 per cent by Chinese doctors (15), nurses (49) and supporting personnel supplied under contract by the Veterans General Hospital of Taipei. The US$25 million facility established by Dr. Hamed Mutabagani has a general clinic, outpatient department, emergency room, intensive care ward, four operating rooms, cardiology unity, dental clinic with its own laboratory, maternity department with two delivery rooms, pediatrics department, EENT department and acupuncture clinic.
Equipment of the Jeddah Clinic is the latest obtainable. But Dr. Mutabagani and his associates are proudest of the human skills that have been assured by leading medical practitioners from Taiwan. The idea for staffing the clinic was born three years ago when Dr. Mutabagani visited the Republic of China at the invitation of Dr. Lu Kuang-shun, Veterans General Hospital deputy director and chief of surgery.
The Saudi Arabian visitor found that the quality of medical services in Taiwan was as high or higher than that offered in Europe. He resolved to seek a staff from the VGH. Another advantage to be gained was the commonality of language and training. Hospitals in Saudi Arabia have tended to be staffed with doctors and nurses from a variety of countries. This sometimes poses communication problems, and the medical methods employed may differ. Chinese medical graduates speak their own language, of course, and read, write and speak English as well.
Chinese nurses of the New Jeddah Clinic, which provides the people of Saudi Arabia with modern medical care. (File photo)
Recruitment for Saudi Arabian service was carried out under a 10-year contract signed by the New Jeddah Clinic and the National Yangming Medical College, which uses the facilities of the Veterans General as a teaching hospital. All of the doctors signed up have a minimum of 10 years of practice. Nurses have been in service at least three years.
The Taiwan group is headed by Dr. Wang Yu-lin, Harvard-trained pediatrician. One of its members is Dr. Chung Chieh, director of VGH's acupuncture department. He is the first to practice acupuncture along with his Western medical skills in Saudi Arabia. All members received orientation that included an intensive course in Arabic. To make the Chinese doctors and nurses feel at home, the New Jeddah Clinic hired two Chinese cooks and imported a container loaded with Chinese foodstuffs.
Staffing of the two government hospitals grew out of the Taipei visit of Dr. Hussein Jazairi, Saudi minister of health. The five medical facilities in various parts of the country represent an important part of the Saudi government's efforts to use oil earnings for the welfare of the people. An important consideration in choosing the Chinese staffers was the success of medical personnel from Taiwan in other countries. The first large group of Chinese doctors and nurses to leave the country was dispatched to Libya many years ago and served with distinction through a change of governments and in the face of other difficulties.
One of the little known links between Saudi Arabia and the Republic of China is Islam. All religions are accepted in Taiwan. There is no establishment faith. Buddhists, Christians, Muslims, Taoists and others are free to build their places of worship, train their priests and serve the people as they believe right. Yet the Chinese people of the island are more familiar with Catholics and Protestants than with the Muslims, who until recently have not had mosques. Even today mosques are open or under construction only in Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung and Lungkang.
According to figures for 1977, the Muslim population of Taiwan is about 45,000 compared with 7.5 million Buddhists, 3.3 million Taoists and some 500,000 Christians. Buddhists have more than 2,500 temples and nearly 8,000 priests. For Taoists the count is about 2,800 temples and 1,300 priests. Roman Catholics have nearly 900 churches and are served by more than 1,900 priests and nuns. Protestants have about 750 ordained ministers and more than 2,100 lay workers. The Muslims have only eight imams, and four of these have just returned from ten years of training in Libya.
Noted visitors to mosques in recent years have included King Faisal of Saudi Arabia, who visited Taiwan in 1971, and Mohammed O. Tawfiq, former communications minister of Saudi Arabia, who attended the memorial rites for President Chiang Kai-shek in 1975. Both expressed intention to help the followers of Islam worship and develop their culture. Minister Tawfiq pledged money for an Islamic cultural center in Taipei and mosques in Taichung and Kaohsiung. The Chinese government agreed to provide the land.
When Tawfiq inquired into the progress of these projects last year, Dawud F.S. Hsu, chairman of the Chinese Muslim Association, was able to tell him that plans were going ahead for the Kaohsiung mosque on a site of 25,800 square feet at Wukuaichu and for the Taichung mosque on a site of 36,000 square feet in the Nantun area. For the Taipei cultural center, a decision in principle has been made to locate it adjacent to the Taipei Grand Mosque in the Taan district. The site is of more than 36,000 square feet. A normal school will be situated at the International Islamic Cultural and Educational Center to teach Arabic and Islamic culture. The King Faisal Memorial Library will be stocked with books in Arabic.
Muslims first came to China during the T'ang reign of Tai Tsung more than 1,300 years ago. One of them laid the foundations for the Canton mosque, Wai-Shih-Zi (Prophet Memorial Mosque). Official contacts between the Imperial Court and the Arab Muslims began in 651, when Caliph Uthman sent a delegation to the Chinese capital of Changan.
Muslims first reached Taiwan with Cheng Chung-kung, the Ming patriot known to the West as Koxinga. Others followed as the Dutch were expelled from the island in 1661. Although the Muslim immigrants numbered some 25,000, only 5,000 to 6,000 of their descendants remain in such communities as Taoyuan, Tamsui, Hsinchu, Lukang, Tainan, Keelung and Taipei. With the Chinese Communist usurpation of the mainland in 1949, some 20,000 followers of Islam made their way to Taiwan.
At the start of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in 1937, President Chiang Kai-shek instructed General Pai Chung-hsi, an Islamic leader, to establish the Chinese Muslim Federation for National Salvation. The name subsequently was changed to the Chinese Islamic Federation for National Salvation, the Chinese Islamic Federation and finally, in 1949, the Chinese Muslim Association, to which all followers of Islam in Taiwan belong.
With government assistance and encouragement, Chinese Muslims make the Haj to Mecca each year. Before the Communist usurpation, some 2,500 Muslims made the Haj from the mainland annually. Since the Communist takeover, no follower of Islam has been allowed to make the pilgrimage. Dawood C.M. Ting, imam of the Taipei Grand Mosque and chairman of the Arabic Language and Culture Department of National Chengchi University, said the government is aware of the importance of the Haj in the life of Muslims. Government scholarships have been extended to young Muslims for study at Islamic University in Median, Saudi Arabia, and the Islamic Foreign Institute in Deida, Libya.
Translation of the Koran into Chinese was carried out by Haji Khalid Wang, former chairman of the GMA, and completed in 1961. Another version was completed by Wang Ching-ehai in 1964. In 1978, some 30 students from the Middle East lived at the Grand Mosque in Taipei for the fast month of Bomadan in August and early Sep tember. At the Breakfast Festival of Eid-Fiter on September 4, more than 2,500 Muslims par ticipated in Taipei religious ceremonies. Diplomats, businessmen and students were present from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Indonesia and Malaysia.
Among the highway engineers building the road from Jeddah to Mecca, a few were Muslims. These were the only members of the construction crew permitted within the Holy City itself. The Saudi Arabians, who are the guardians of the great Islamic shrines, have been impressed by the Chinese respect for their religion and its holy places.
In recent years, the Chinese programs in the Middle East have been principally concerned with infrastructure projects, industry and trade. At the outset, however, the preoccupation was with agriculture. One of the first exercises in free Chinese technical assistance to others came in Libya, where green fields were wrested from the desert. Agriculture also has been important in the programs carried out in Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
One of the secrets of Chinese technical success has been willingness to improvise. Africans and Arabs initially expressed surprise that the Chinese were willing to get out in the field and dig their I own ditches for irrigation projects or grow their own vegetables for food. Europeans had tried and failed in some areas where the Chinese tried and succeeded. In agriculture, the Chinese took along their simple machines - power tillers, threshers and tillers. They did not ask for big and expensive tractors. Those they were teaching could buy or make the simple machines and gadgets that were employed to grow better crops and make life easier.
On the other hand, the Chinese. have not foolishly rejected the tools and technology without which some jobs could not be done. Highway construction, especially under the torrid conditions of Saudi Arabia and Jordan. requires bull dozers and graders of the highest quality. The Chinese have them. Medical technicians cannot work without laboratory equipment. The Chinese took it with them or specified what had to be obtained.
In all of these programs, there is deep respect for the country involved, its people and its culture. The Chinese follow the middle way at home. This has enabled them to absorb other peoples through thousands of years of history. Even European colonizers got far less in China than in most other lands that were similarly -late in embracing the scientific revolution. Tolerance and moderation have enabled the Chinese to get along, to view the folk habits of others with charity and even understanding, and not to try changing everything which differs from their own customs.
Saudi Arabia has looked at the Chinese of the mainland and the Chinese of Taiwan and concluded that the latter represent the real main stream of Chinese civilization, culture and political preference. Saudis have rebuffed the advances of the Chinese Communists while welcoming the friendship of the free Chinese. They believe in the friendship and goodwill of the Republic of China. The Chinese Communists have cultivated the Arabs only for their own gain and advancement. For Saudi Arabia, friendship and partner ship with the Republic of China hasn't meant any special demands for the oil that Taiwan so obviously needs.
The two countries are convinced that their anti-communism makes them brothers under the skin. This has been made evident in the decision of. North Yemen to employ retired Chinese Air Force personnel to train their fledgling air components. Saudi Arabia is greatly interested in this project and no doubt gave at least informal approval to the arrangement, as did the United States, from which North Yemen's planes are coming.
There is awareness in both Riyadh and Taipei that North Yemen stands as an essential buffer between the Soviet-supported Marxist regime of South Yemen and the oil fields of Saudi Arabia. If Saudi oil should come under Communist control, the tragedy for the free world would be immeasurable. The Republic of China is as deter mined as the Saudis and the Americans to do everything possible to prevent this from happening.
Visiting the Republic of China in 1971, King Faisal Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud expressed the Saudi Arabian view of Communism. ''The basic beliefs of Islamism," he said, "are to love men and to live in peace with others. Hence the Islamite are friends of the people of any locality where preaching of Islamism is allowed. Unfortunately, we recently saw the appearance of a heresy called Communism. It has infiltrated into all parts of the world and made many people renounce their faith, thereby becoming atheists... It is incomprehensible that there are people who believe in a doctrine like Communism. As a matter of fact, any country that allows the existence of the Communists will only see the decadence of its national spirit. It will only invite destruction and turn the country into a land of desolation. It will achieve neither prosperity nor progress. If those present here think that Saudi Arabia today enjoys stability and prosperity, it is because we have not let the Communists infiltrate into our land by virtue of the existence of traditional thoughts and laws based on Islamism."
The views of Saudi Arabia on Communism did not change with the passing of King Faisal.