He noticed:

“…… huge holdings of foreign exchange, the wealth it adds yearly to the world economy and the promise its further growth”

“It’s international goals and policies matter as never before. So does the nature of its nationalism and what kind of a world its regime feels safest in.”

And his friend reveals:

” a struggle over the appropriation of symbols, a struggle over how the past and present shall be understood and labeled, a struggle to identify causes and assess blame, a contentious effort to give partisan meaning to local history……”