
China celebrates growth in wealth, power -- and height
CNN
Last week, as China celebrated the 72nd anniversary of Communist Party rule with a week-long public holiday, state-run media cranked up the patriotism to hail the country's economic rise, military achievements, political clout -- and even the height of its men.
Several outlets, including nationalist tabloid the Global Times and broadcaster CCTV, ran reports about a study -- published last year in The Lancet medical journal -- that analyzed the evolution of average heights worldwide. Of the countries examined, China saw the largest male height increase -- between 1985 and 2019, the average height of 19-year-old men in China increased by nearly 3.5 inches (9 centimeters).

More than two decades ago, on January 24, 2004, I landed in Baghdad as a legal adviser, assigned an office in what was then known as the Green Zone. It was raining and cold, and my duffle bag was thrown into a puddle off the C-130 aircraft that had just done a corkscrew dive to reach the runway without risk of ground fire. Young American soldiers greeted me as we piled into a vehicle, sped out of the airport complex and then along a road called the “Highway of Death” due to car bombs and snipers.












