Friends,
There is a Chinese idiom about “borrowing a boat to go to sea.” It is about using what others own and their resources to do an important task for yourself.
In modern-day usage it refers to the way in which the Chinese Communist Party “borrows” the legitimacy of foreign elites and media outlets to push its preferred messages and narratives.
[For more on this practice, see Sarah Cook’s Beijing’s Global Megaphone: The Expansion of Chinese Communist Party Media Influence since 2017 from Freedom House, January 2020]
Last week, an esteemed member of the American foreign and defense policy community turned himself in a “borrowed boat.”
Harvard Professor Graham Allison at the global release of his latest book, “Escaping Thucydides’s Trap: Dialogue with Graham Allison on China-US Relations” in Beijing at the Center for China & Globalization.
When one looks up the definition of an American foreign policy elite, Professor Graham Allison’s name appears at the top of the list.
Allison, now in his 80s, has spent nearly his entire professional career at Harvard, with more than a decade serving as the Dean of the Harvard Kennedy School and more than two decades as the Director of Harvard’s Belfer Center. He molded countless students over the past six decades, advised Presidents, Secretaries and Members of Congress, and is a prolific commentator to the public, with nearly 20 articles in nearly every major media outlet in just the past year alone.
While closely associated with American foreign and defense policy circles stretching back to the Johnson Administration, he served only briefly as a special advisor to Secretary of Defense Casper Weinberger during the Reagan Administration and less than seven months as an Assistant Secretary of Defense in the first year of Clinton’s presidency. Allison’s resignation followed closely on the heels of Les Aspin’s resignation as Secretary of Defense following the disaster in Mogadishu in October 1993.
Allison is an acolyte and devotee of Henry Kissinger going back to the 1960s and like Kissinger, Allison has become a “good friend” to the leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (Chinese dissidents, Tibetans, Uyghurs, and Taiwanese… not so much).
For the last decade, Allison has been a darling of Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party. His 2015 article in The Atlantic, “The Thucydides Trap: Are the U.S. and China Headed for War?” and his subsequent 2017 book, Destined for War: Can America and China Escape the Thucydides’s Trap provided the perfect geopolitical framing for the Party. Allison has staked his continued relevance to the ideas he put forward in these works.
In these works of popular nonfiction, Professor Allison “proves” that the only way for the United States and the People’s Republic to avoid a war is for America to accommodate China’s rise. To Allison, China’s rise to global dominance is inevitable and has already happened. America must work hard to prevent a war from taking place.
You might wonder, how can a Professor, even one as smart as Allison and from Harvard no less, “prove” something like that?
Well, the Professor will tell you, as he told his audience in Beijing last week.
There are “patterns in history” and we just need to read Thucydides’ work, The History of the Peloponnesian War… written in the late 5th Century BC to see them.
According to Professor Allison, since Thucydides was the first historian (the “founder and father of history”), he understood what caused the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides wrote that it was the fault of the incumbent power failing to accommodate the rise of the new power, and Allison has found other examples of this pattern: Q.E.D. (quod erat demonstrandum).
To quote Professor Allison (starting at minute 43:05), “the Thucydides Trap is the dangerous dynamic that occurs when a rapidly rising power seriously threatens to displace a ruling power. I’ll do it again, the rapidly rising power seriously threatens to displace the major ruling power.”
Coming from the lips of such a respected American, this is music to Xi’s ears [it also helps that Professor Allison mixes in heavy helpings of praise for the wisdom and intelligence of the Chairman of Everything. Xi and his assistants understood Allison’s arguments before anyone else]. Since the PRC’s rise is just as inevitable as Athens’ rise was, it is therefore the responsibility of the “ruling power” to accommodate that rise to avoid a war.
For the past decade, Beijing has used the “Thucydides Trap” trope as a bludgeon to pound on their dual narratives: China’s rise is inevitable, and the resulting tensions are Washington’s fault (because Thucydides said so).
I have to give Professor Allison credit for his neat trick: take an example from antiquity that few people know the details of, cherry-pick other obscure historical examples (16 of them to be precise), assert that it provides some sort of cosmic lesson, and ingratiate yourself to an authoritarian regime that craves legitimacy to cover over its aggression and coercion.
There are of course other stories we could tell with history that would paint a different picture than what Xi and his cadres prefer.
One example was the book by Hal Brands and Michael Beckley titled Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China. Brands and Beckley reject Allison’s thesis and write that the real danger is a peaking power that sees its window of opportunity closing and decides to launch a risky military campaign to reverse its fortunes (this is Imperial Germany in 1914 and Imperial Japan in 1941). Needless to say, their book is not being published by CITIC Press Group, and those two scholars are not being invited to a stage in Beijing or for meetings with Chairman Xi.
Another way to conceptualize the what’s happening between the U.S. and the PRC is to look at the inward turn that Xi has made over the past decade and his reliance on Han chauvinism, ultra-nationalism, and neo-imperialism to stoke ideas of grievance and victimization within the Chinese people to grant Xi and the Party legitimacy as their economic model sputters. Under this “history” we could find examples of authoritarian leaders that vilify the “other” and invest in massive military build-ups to prop up their domestic hold on power.
When I first read Professor Allison’s Destined for War, I thought of another work of history, though quite not as old as Thucydides: Margaret MacMillan’s 2010 book, The Uses and Abuses of History. She describes how Governments, and their surrogates (IMHO that is what Professor Allison has become), use history for their own contemporary ends, either covering up inconvenient bits of history (see #2 below) or popularizing an obscure event that can be seen as analogous with the present day (side-eye at Allison’s work).
Unsurprisingly, Xi and his cadres aren’t aroused by MacMillan’s book, or these other explanations for the tension in the Sino-American relationship. Perhaps because it hits a little too close to home.
A New Book for a ‘New Age’
Allison’s 2017 book was starting to get a bit long in the tooth (written before Trump entered office and before the pandemic), so what is an authoritarian regime to do when their most useful narrative tool gets a bit worn out?
Write another book!
Voilà… Escaping the Thucydides Trap: Dialogue with Graham Allison on China-US Relations
The next step is to unveil the book, with much fanfare, during an important event and place the American surrogate alongside the Great Leader, to ensure that everyone understands that this narrative and this explanation for what’s happening in the world is at the center of the regime’s renewed narrative and everyone understands the “Party line.”
A Rogues’ Gallery of CCP influence on U.S. policy-making – American CEOs and other leaders meeting with Xi Jinping following the China Development Forum last week. Professor Graham Allison, who is not a CEO, is second from the right in the front row.
For the past few years, Wang Huiyao, founder and President of a dependable Communist Party think tank (Center for China & Globalization) and Professor Allison teamed up to reboot his 2017 book, make it more pithy and easy to consume. Conveniently, CITIC Press Group, the publisher belonging to the PRC’s largest state-owned conglomerate, was interested in publishing this next great volume featuring Professor Allison’s ideas about Sino-American relations.
Simultaneously, the Party (and Professor Allison) found an equally dependable foreign publisher, Springer Nature Group, to distribute the book outside of the PRC.
You might remember that Springer Nature Group has shown itself to be a dependable “friend” to the Chinese Communist Party. In 2017, the company blocked access in the PRC to articles that the Party found sensitive, topics like Taiwan, Human Rights, Tibet, and elite politics (See “Leading Western Publisher Bows to Chinese Censorship,” Javier Hernandez, New York Times, November 1, 2017).
Three years later, Springer Nature was at it again, rejecting an article for their medical journal Eye and Vision. The author of the article, a Taiwanese Doctor, refused to add the word “China” after “Taiwan” in her paper, so Springer Nature refused to publish it telling her that identifying Taiwan as a part of China was required under its editorial policies (See “Taiwan academics told to identify as Chinese in journal,” Charlie Parker, Times of London, October 10, 2020 and “Springer Nature Journal Rejects Article by Taiwan Doctor Over Country Name,” RFA, September 1, 2020).
If you take the time to watch the book roll-out in Beijing, you see Jacob Dreyer, a Springer Nature Group Senior Editor, on stage praising his hosts and blaming his home country for all the tension and problems in the relationship. Again, music to the ears of Xi and his cadres.
About halfway through Professor Allison’s rambling remarks, he give an assignment to the audience to write-down the incentives to compete and the incentives to cooperate. Setting up a false choice that I’ve personally seen PRC officials deploy in their negotiations with the United States on multiple occasions.
We’re led to believe our only options are between “cooperation,” which will lead to peace, prosperity and stability, and “competition” which Graham suggests would result in a nuclear war “where everyone is dead.” In the real world, beyond Professor Allison’s grim musings, those aren’t our only options and there is a difference between “competition” and “conflict.” One might compete with a rival over years and decades and still avoid waging the war in which everyone dies.
That’s probably enough, so I’ll close with this clip from The Simpsons:
“And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords. I would like to remind them that as a trusted TV personality, I can be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground sugar caves.”
***
What’s the probability of armed conflict between Beijing and Manila?
From Rogue One (2016)
I think it is more likely than not, that Beijing will use military force to annex seize Second Thomas Shoal from the Republic of the Philippines soon.
For years, the PRC has made the spurious claim that Ayungin Shoal (also known as Second Thomas Shoal) belongs to China (a feature Beijing calls Ren’ai Jiao). The reef lies 194 km west of the Philippines, well within the Philippine Exclusive Economic Zone, and 1,138 km from the closest PRC shoreline.
In July 2016, the UNCLOS tribunal at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague ruled against Beijing’s claims on Second Thomas Shoal (page 453):
Section 1153. As set out above, the Tribunal has now found that Second Thomas Shoal is a low-tide elevation (see paragraphs 379 to 381) and, as such, generates no entitlement to maritime zones of its own. The Tribunal has also found that none of the high-tide features in the Spratly Islands is a fully entitled island for the purposes of Article 121 of the Convention (see paragraphs 473 to 647 above). The Tribunal has also found that there are no high-tide features within 12 nautical miles of Second Thomas Shoal (see paragraph 632 above). From these conclusions, it follows that there exists no legal basis for any entitlement by China to maritime zones in the area of Second Thomas Shoal. There is as a result no situation of overlapping entitlements that would call for the application of Articles 15, 74, or 83 to delimit the overlap. Nor is there any need to address sovereignty over Second Thomas Shoal before the Tribunal may consider China’s actions there. Second Thomas Shoal is a low-tide elevation located within the exclusive economic zone of the Philippines.
Emphasis mine.
Xi and his admirals ignored this ruling and continues to push the Philippines out by blocking resupply missions to the Philippine military outpost on the Shoal.
At the end of this week, Philippine President Marcos summoned his national security team and consulted with Manila’s allies. It appears that President Marcos is ready to mount an even larger resupply mission to the BRP Sierra Madre, the Philippine Navy ship that has been grounded on the Shoal since 1999 and operated as a military outpost.
On Thursday, President Marcos tweeted his intentions.
As these developments were taking place in Manila, a group from the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations was visiting the Headquarters of U.S. INDOPACOM in Hawaii. Whether he was a part of this delegation or from another, the former PRC Ambassador to the United States Cui Tiankai met with U.S. military leaders in Hawaii at the same time.
I haven’t been able to confirm, but I have heard that Ambassador Cui told the INDOPACOM Commander that the PLA Navy will take Second Thomas Shoal… and that the United States must “mind its own business.”
Thanks for reading!
Matt
MUST READ
1. Statement from Ambassador Katherine Tai on the People’s Republic of China’s Request for WTO Consultations Regarding the Inflation Reduction Act
Office of the United States Trade Representative, March 26, 2024
Today, the United States Mission to the World Trade Organization (WTO) received a consultation request from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) regarding parts of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 and its implementing measures.
Statement from Ambassador Tai:
The Inflation Reduction Act is a groundbreaking tool for the United States to seriously address the global climate crisis and invest in U.S. economic competitiveness. It is our contribution to a clean energy future that we are collectively seeking with our allies and partners. Meanwhile, the PRC continues to use unfair, non-market policies and practices to undermine fair competition and pursue the dominance of the PRC’s manufacturers both in the PRC and in global markets.
Under President Biden’s leadership, we are tackling the climate crisis while strengthening America’s supply chains and energy security. We are building a clean energy economy, powered by American innovators, workers, and manufacturers that will create good-paying union jobs and cut the pollution that drives climate change and environmental injustice.
Through this bold action, the United States will continue to pursue major new investments in clean energy technology, from solar and wind to batteries and electric vehicles and beyond. The United States will also continue to work with allies and partners to address the PRC’s unfair, non-market policies and practices.
We are carefully reviewing the consultation request.
COMMENT – We should let Luther, President Obama’s Anger Translator, interpret the last line of Ambassador Tai’s Statement.
It means: “Beijing, go f*&k yourself.”
As Paul Krugman wrote in an OpEd in the New York Times this week, “for China, of all countries, to complain about targeted subsidies is an act of colossal chutzpah.” The Chinese Communist Party has been employing massive subsidies and other violations of WTO rules to favor Chinese companies and discriminate against foreign companies since they entered the organization in 2001.
Beijing is upset because other countries are starting to treat the PRC in the same way Beijing has treated them for decades.
As our nearly three-decade experiment with the WTO is coming to an end, reciprocity is replacing unenforceable rules.
2. Xi Jinping’s Historians Can’t Stop Rewriting China’s Imperial Past
Chun Han Wong, Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2024
A vast effort to draft an official history of the Qing dynasty is in limbo as China’s leader demands it be bent to his vision.
China’s Communist Party often speaks proudly about what it claims to be 5,000 years of Chinese civilization. But its leaders are still struggling to decide what they should say about the past few centuries.
For decades, Chinese scholars have been toiling at the party’s behest to draft an official history of the Qing, China’s last imperial dynasty, which the Manchu ethnic group led for nearly 270 years before its collapse in the early 20th century. Beijing has devoted thousands of researchers and millions of dollars to the task, producing a draft that runs into the tens of millions of characters over more than 100 volumes.
However, an ideological hardening under Chinese leader Xi Jinping has set back the publication of the epic tome already more than a decade overdue—underscoring how the Communist Party has tightened its grip on history to advance its goals.
The Qing era is central to the Communist Party’s claims to have saved China from its “century of humiliation,” inflicted on it by foreign powers, stretching from the Qing’s defeat in the Opium Wars—the first of which began in 1839—to the founding of the People’s Republic in 1949. The legitimacy of China’s current borders, largely inherited from the Qing, is also closely intertwined with territorial claims from that period.
Party vetters, including a top historian backed by Xi, issued sweeping criticisms of the draft “Qing History” last year, saying it strayed too far from official views and requesting changes to better align the past with Xi’s vision for the future, according to people familiar with the project.
The criticisms centered on political issues including the assertion that the draft “doesn’t speak for the people,” one of those people said.
COMMENT – This is not the actions of a confident leader or of confident elites.
3. China targets group of MPs and peers with string of cyber-attacks
Jane Clinton, The Guardian, March 23, 2024
China has targeted a group of MPs and peers at Westminster in a string of cyber-attacks, it has been reported.
On Monday, the deputy prime minister, Oliver Dowden, is expected to inform parliament of the attacks.
Meanwhile, Sir Iain Duncan Smith, former Tory education minister Tim Loughton, cross-bench peer Lord Alton of Liverpool and Stewart McDonald, a Scottish National party MP, have been called on to attend a briefing from Alison Giles, parliament’s director of security.
Duncan Smith, Loughton, Alton and McDonald are members of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (Ipac), which monitors and scrutinises Beijing.
Foreign secretary David Cameron will also hold a meeting of the 1922 Committee during which the topic of China and security is likely to be discussed, the Sunday Times reported.
The forthcoming China update is believed to be related to the work of the Defending Democracy taskforce, a ministerial committee which monitors and identifies threats and interference in the UK’s elections and democratic system.
At an Ipac meeting on Friday, Luke de Pulford, its executive director, said: “About a year ago the Belgian and French foreign ministries publicly confirmed [Chinese state] sponsored cyber-attacks against our members.
“Other countries have done the same privately. Beijing has made no secret of their desire to attack foreign politicians who dare to stand up to them.”
Last year, a parliamentary researcher was arrested over allegations of spying.
Chris Cash, who denies the allegation, worked for the China Research Group, which was set up by security minister Tom Tugendhat. He was also employed as a researcher by Tory MP Alicia Kearns, who chairs the foreign affairs select committee.
Last summer, a report by the Commons intelligence and security committee (ISC) claimed China was “prolifically and aggressively” targeting the UK and had managed to “successfully penetrate every sector of the UK’s economy”.
4. Hong Kongers Are Purging the Evidence of Their Lost Freedom
Maya Wang, New York Times, March 26, 2024
“What should I do with those copies of Apple Daily?”
Someone in Hong Kong I was chatting with on the phone recently had suddenly dropped her voice to ask that question, referring to the pro-democracy newspaper that the government forced to shut down in 2021.
“Should I toss them or send them to you?”
My conversations with Hong Kong friends are peppered with such whispers these days. Last week, the city enacted a draconian security law — its second serious legislative assault on Hong Kong’s freedoms since 2020. Known as Article 23, the new law expands the National Security Law and criminalizes such vague behavior as the possession of information that is “directly or indirectly useful to an external force.”
Hong Kong was once a place where people did not live in fear. It had rule of law, a rowdy press and a semi-democratic legislature that kept the powerful in check. The result was a city with a freewheeling energy unmatched in China. Anyone who grew up in China in the 1980s and 1990s could sing the Cantopop songs of Hong Kong stars like Anita Mui, and that was a problem for Beijing: Freedom was glamorous, desirable.
When Britain handed Hong Kong back to China in 1997, the city’s people accepted, in good faith, Beijing’s promises that its capitalist system and way of life would remain unchanged for 50 years and that the city would move toward universal suffrage in the election of its leader.
5. Chinese state TV reports passage of Hong Kong security law before vote
Chen Zifei, RFA, March 20, 2024
CCTV beats global news organizations by reporting the news before it happened.
When Hong Kong’s Legislative Council passed a strict national security law under Article 23 of its mini-constitution, the long-expected move hit global headlines within minutes.
Yet China's state broadcaster CCTV was faster than any of them -- it beat out its competitors by posting the results of the vote to its news client on social media platforms nearly 20 minutes before Council members had even started voting.
The Council's 89 lawmakers, all of whom won their seats under new electoral rules that allow only “patriots” loyal to Beijing to stand, voted unanimously to pass the Safeguarding National Security Law, that makes treason, insurrection and sabotage punishable by up to life in prison.
In scenes reminiscent of China's rubber-stamp parliament, the National People's Congress, lawmaker after lawmaker stood up to extol the benefits of the law, which will likely widen an ongoing crackdown on peaceful dissent, according to its critics.
COMMENT - This is just classic.
6. The West Needs a War Footing
Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Wall Street Journal, March 28, 2024
FDR enlisted William S. Knudsen in 1940 to ramp weapons production up. As Russia continues pounding Ukraine, it’s time to do it again.
Two years after Russia invaded, Ukrainian forces are outgunned. Russia has a 6-to-1 ammunition advantage along the front lines. If this persists, Vladimir Putin’s ambitions will become a reality.
The imbalance in weapons supplies is a major failure of Ukraine’s allies in the West. North Korea delivered as much artillery ammunition to Russia in one month as the European Union has been able to deliver to Ukraine in one year. Russia produces three million shells a year, while the U.S. and Europe combined are able to produce only 1.2 million for Kyiv. Despite the vast economic might of the democratic world, we are being outproduced by an arsenal of autocracy in Russia, Iran and North Korea.
If Western allies don’t immediately ramp up the supply of weapons and ammunition to Ukraine, the future will be bleak. If Mr. Putin isn’t stopped in Ukraine, it will mean decades of instability and conflict in Europe. We need to wake up to that danger and put our economies on a war footing.
Turning the tide requires political decisions. Congress must approve the stalled $60 billion in aid for Ukraine—with haste. Yet such change also requires leadership from industry. If we are to defend freedom and democracy, CEOs must step up as they did during World War II.
In the late 1930s, Western democracies were dangerously unprepared for the threats posed by the rapidly arming autocracies of Germany and Japan. In May 1940, this complacency was brutally exposed. Nazi forces stormed into the Netherlands, Belgium and France, soon leaving Britain alone in the fight for democracy in Europe. In the White House, President Franklin D. Roosevelt recognized that the U.S. urgently needed to ramp up military production and put the economy on a war footing. To do so, he knew the man to call: William S. Knudsen.
Knudsen was CEO of General Motors, a man with vast experience in the automobile industry and one of the best-paid business leaders in the U.S. Roosevelt tasked him with transforming America’s industrial production, making it the arsenal of democracy. For his efforts, Knudsen would receive the token sum of $1 a year.
Knudsen threw himself into the task. He made lists of the required weapons and ammunition: 50,000 planes, 13,000 mortar shells, 33 million artillery shells, 300,000 machine guns with ammunition, 1.3 million rifles with ammunition, 380 warships. He then traveled across the country to meet with industry leaders, visit factories and sign contracts.
Knudsen recognized that speed was crucial. In meetings with company and union leaders, he applied maximum pressure to ramp up production. His message was clear: “We are here to help you, and all we ask in return is that you give us speed and more speed. We need every machine running at full speed. . . . We must outproduce Hitler.” Within five months, Knudsen had signed 920 contracts with some 500 companies.
All of American society was mobilized to fight, and within a year the economy was on a war footing. Knudsen’s methods were controversial, and his direct style often led to confrontation with politicians and unions. But thanks to his network, his understanding of factory-floor conditions, and his ability to organize workers and machines, he got his way. He was pivotal in turning the tide against Germany and Japan.
If we could do it once, we can do it again. In the face of the renewed threat from a militarized autocracy, we must replicate Knudsen’s achievement and put our economies on a war footing. This will require action from politicians, industry and labor unions—as well as leaders who can cut through endless discussions, red tape and long delivery times.
Here are five ideas to get the ball rolling:
First, governments should enter into long-term contracts with the arms industry, to ensure that companies have the necessary capital to expand capacity swiftly.
Second, the contracting process should be simplified and shortened. A signed letter of intent should be enough to get production up and running quickly, leaving legal details to be sorted along the way.
Third, we should temporarily relax the rules on tendering defense contracts, so that production can begin with direct orders to companies that are able to deliver weapons or ammunition immediately.
Fourth, the defense industry should be allowed to depreciate investments in new production facilities faster than normal, to reflect the hopefully shorter horizon for war and conflict.
Fifth, sovereign wealth funds, as well as private pension and investment funds, should set up special pools for defense-industry investments. This will attract the private capital needed for rapid expansion of our defense industries.
We need to embrace a new mind-set. We need politicians who dare to tell the truth—including that defense and military-equipment investments are an essential element in the defense of freedom and peace. We need business and labor leaders prepared to take responsibility beyond the interests of their individual companies. Ultimately, we need a new William S. Knudsen.
COMMENT – I’m not sure what it will take to force the Biden Administration to take defense spending and the mobilization of the defense industrial base seriously. Spending enormous amounts on climate-related pet projects is an incredibly unwise thing to do these days.
Authoritarianism
7. ‘Insane’: Xi’s call for ethnic Chinese to tell Beijing’s story stirs anger
Frederik Kelter, Al Jazeera, March 23, 2024
8. What to make of China’s massive cyber-espionage campaign
The Economist, March 26, 2024
9. Hong Kong's new national security law enforced for first time
Kenji Kawase and Peggy Ye, Nikkei Asia, March 26, 2024
10. Piercing the Veil of Secrecy: The Surveillance Role of China’s MSS and MPS
Minxin Pei, China Leadership Monitor, February 29, 2024
11. Xi Jinping’s Self-Defeating Governance: Policy Implications and Power Politics with the Rise of Military-Industrial Leaders
Guoguang Wu, China Leadership Monitor, February 29, 2024
12. The Aftermath of China’s Comedy Crackdown
Chang Che, New Yorker, March 26, 2024
13. Why Are China’s Nationalists Attacking the Country’s Heroes?
Joy Dong and Vivian Wang, New York Times, March 26, 2024
14. ‘No force’ can stop China’s tech progress, Xi Jinping tells Dutch PM
Laura He, CNN, March 28, 2024
Xi’s comments come as a chip war rages between China and Western countries, including the Netherlands, which is home to ASML — the world’s sole manufacturer of extreme ultraviolet lithography machines needed to make advanced semiconductors.
“Artificially creating technological barriers and cutting off industrial and supply chains will only lead to division and confrontation,” Xi told Rutte during a meeting in Beijing on Wednesday, according to a readout published by China’s foreign ministry.
There was no mention of ASML in the readout, but the company said in January that it had been prohibited by the Dutch government from shipping some of its lithography machines to China.
That came after the United States ramped up restrictions on the types of semiconductors that American companies can sell to China and pressed its allies to enact their own.
15. US CEOs Extend China Stay After Last-Minute Invite to Meet Xi
Bloomberg, March 25, 2024
16. China blocks use of Intel and AMD chips in government computers
Ryan McMorrow, Nian Liu, and Qianer Liu, Financial Times, March 23, 2024
Environmental Harms
17. EU climate envoys plan joint trip to China
Stuart Lau, Zia Weise, and Karl Mathiesen, Politico, March 25, 2024
18. US, Argentina to Cooperate, Combat Illegal Chinese Fishing
Neal Kuo, Voice of America, March 28, 2024
19. In isolated South China Sea territory, Filipino fisherman see ‘dwindling catch’
Jeoffrey Maitem and Mark Navales, Radio Free Asia, March 28, 2024
20. Analysis: Record drop in China’s CO2 emissions needed to meet 2025 target
Lauri Myllyvirta, Resilience, March 26, 2024
Foreign Interference and Coercion
21. VIDEO – China's dirty tactics to control the Pacific
60 Minutes Australia, March 24, 2024
When China’s powerful foreign minister Wang Yi met his Australian counterpart Penny Wong a few days ago, the pair, albeit awkwardly, smiled and shook hands for the cameras. But behind closed doors there’s no doubt the atmosphere would have been much less cordial.
Both nations have plenty of differences to work through, including the ongoing battle for influence in the Pacific. While Canberra takes a more softly-softly approach to our near neighbours, that’s not Beijing’s way of doing business. In a joint investigation by 60 MINUTES, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, Nick McKenzie reveals some of the downright dirty tactics China uses to assert its dominance over tiny nations like Fiji.
22. Where did that Chinese police video come from?
Graeme Smith and Daria Impiombato, The Interpreter, March 25, 2024
23. VIDEO – I Overheard a Secret Chinese Meeting in Micronesia on Vacation
Rare Earth, YouTube, November 18, 2023
COMMENT – I came across this video and found it fascinating. A couple vacationing in Micronesia were having dinner and at the next table a PRC Official was bribing a Micronesian Governor to keep the U.S. out of the region.
24. China: Arunachal ours, India illegally occupied
Times of India, March 26, 2024
China on Monday continued to claim that Arunachal Pradesh has “always been” its territory, notwithstanding India dismissing Beijing’s claim as “absurd” and “ludicrous.”
COMMENT – It boggles my mind why the PRC continues to pick fights with its neighbors. Insisting that an Indian province “has always belonged to China” is not only “absurd” as the Indian Foreign Minister rightly points out, but strategically stupid.
It is as if Beijing wants to make it as easy as possible for countries to gang-up against it.
25. China continues to harp on its claim over Arunachal Pradesh
Times of India, March 25, 2024
26. ‘Won’t compromise’: Jaishankar on boundary issue with China
Times of India, March 27, 2024
27. New Zealand joins U.K. and U.S. in condemning China-linked hacks
Sophie Mak, Nikkei Asia, March 26, 2024
28. ‘Structural’ problem: top China scholar says US tensions will be ‘with us for a long time’
Dewey Sim, South China Morning Post, March 25, 2024
29. Chinese ex-trade negotiator who backed Trump slams US for ‘dismantling the system’ of global trade
Frank Chen, South China Morning Post, March 26, 2024
30. China accused of ‘malign attack’ after Electoral Commission hack
Oliver Wright, Sunday Times, March 24, 2024
31. VIDEO – The United States, China, and the Future of the Global Order
Asia Society, YouTube, March 22, 2024
32. HACK ATTACK Chinese hackers access 40 MILLION Brit voters’ personal details in shocking strike at heart of our democracy
Harry Cole, The Sun, March 24, 2024
33. China and Russia challenge US claim to mineral-rich stretches of seabed
Kenza Bryan, Josh Gabert-Doyon, and Demetri Sevastopulo, Financial Times, March 25, 2024
Human Rights and Religious Persecution
34. UK secretly softens policy on Chinese firms accused of human rights abuse
Richard Holmes, iNews, March 20, 2024
35. Uyghur publisher jailed for books on Uyghur independence, identity
Shohret Hoshur, RFA, March 23, 2024
36. Tribute to deceased Chinese dissident exposes fractures at UN rights body
Emma Farge, Reuters, March 22, 2024
China Media Project, March 22, 2024
38. China steps up checks for people bypassing the ‘Great Firewall’
Qiang Lang, RFA, March 26, 2024
Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage
39. China’s Tech Sector May Rival Property as Growth Driver, BE Says
Tom Hancock, Bloomberg, March 25, 2024
40. No longer in Belt and Road Initiative, Italy focuses on strategic ties with China, leaders invited to Beijing this year
Ambrose Li, South China Morning Post, March 24, 2024
41. Europe’s economy is under attack from all sides
The Economist, March 26, 2024
42. Once High-Flying Bankers in Hong Kong Become a Lost Generation
Lulu Yilun Chen and Denise Wee, Bloomberg, March 24, 2024
43. iPhone Shipments in China Fell 33% in February, State Data Show
Bloomberg, March 26, 2024
44. Tim Cook’s Love for China Helps Xi Fight Fears of Economic Slump
Bloomberg, March 25, 2024
45. Tim Cook praises China’s ‘critical’ role in Apple’s business
Ryan McMorrow, Thomas Hale, and Wang Xueqiao, Financial Times, March 20, 2024
46. China Manufacturing Drive Risks Higher US Inflation, NY Fed Says
Ben Holland, Bloomberg, March 26, 2024
47. Unpacking Linkages Between the Chinese State and Private Firms
Ilaria Mazzocco, Big Data China, March 21, 2024
48. China’s Attempts to Reduce Its Strategic Vulnerabilities to Financial Sanctions
Zongyuan Zoe Liu, China Leadership Monitor, February 29, 2024
49. ByteDance Holds Firm Against Selling TikTok Despite U.S. Ban Threat
Du Zhihang, Guan Cong, Qu Yunxu, and Denise Jia, Caixin, March 26, 2024
50. Why China’s Middle Class Is Losing Its Confidence
Cao Li, Wall Street Journal, March 22, 2024
51. IMF head says China at ‘fork in the road’ on reforms to boost demand
Joe Leahy, Financial Times, March 23, 2024
52. U.S.-China Decoupling Poses Supply-Chain Risks for Drug Companies
David Wainer, Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2024
53. ‘Cherry on the Cake’: How China Views the U.S. Crackdown on TikTok
Ravi Mattu, New York Times, March 23, 2024
54. China Files WTO Complaint Against U.S. Over Electric-Vehicle Subsidies
Sha Hua, Wall Street Journal, March 26, 2024
55. WTO says Australian duties on Chinese steel products were flawed
Reuters, March 26, 2024
56. China lifts penalties on Australian wine after more than three devastating years
Simone McCarthy and Angus Watson, CNN, March 28, 2024
China has announced it is lifting punishing tariffs on Australian wines more than three years after imposing penalties that devastated the industry and were a major point of friction between the trading partners.
China’s Ministry of Commerce on Thursday said that “in view of the changes in the wine market conditions in China,” it was “no longer necessary to impose anti-dumping duties and countervailing duties on imported wines originating from Australia.”
The measure would come into effect on Friday, two days before the end of a five-month review period agreed on by Canberra and Beijing that saw Australia suspend a dispute on the issue at the World Trade Organization for that period.
COMMENT – So the price of Beijing ending the tariffs is that Canberra must drop the WTO case?
57. The U.S. Investors Caught in the Scrum Over TikTok
Lauren Hirsch, New York Times, March 26, 2024
58. American Business Stalls in China
Newley Purnell and Clarence Leong, Wall Street Journal, March 27, 2024
Cyber & Information Technology
59. Canada to Toughen Foreign Investment Rules for AI, Space Technology
Brian Platt and Laura Dhillon Kane, Bloomberg, March 26, 2024
60. China’s use of foreign open-source software, and how to counter it
Albert Zhang, The Strategist, March 27, 2024
The Wall Street Journal recently exposed a 2022 Chinese government directive, named Document 79, that requires state-owned enterprises to replace proprietary foreign software such as operating systems, email services and word processors in their IT systems with Chinese-built versions by 2027. It was part of Beijing’s multi-decade effort to become technologically self-sufficient in the face of strategic competition from other countries, and it’s using open-source software as a means to close the technological gap.
This poses a dilemma for the US, Australia and its partners. Since open-source software is shared freely and developed collaboratively, China’s efforts to develop local versions forces democracies to decide whether they should allow their own software engineers to contribute to Chinese projects that may end up modernising the country’s military, intelligence and political systems.
China’s pursuit of open-source software started in the 1990s when Gong Ming, the founder of Beijing Ningsi Software (aka Linx Software), transferred copies of the Linux operating system from Finland to China. For that action, Gong is now known as the father of China’s Linux and continues to develop software for the government. This includes software for the Ministry of State Security (MSS), which has been central in shaping Beijing’s policies to build its own open-source ecosystem that it can control.
Operating systems and other critical software are important because they can pose significant cybersecurity risks if their vulnerabilities are not patched, as made evident by EternalBlue, a computer exploit developed by the US National Security Agency. That’s why Beijing has long been suspicious of foreign operating systems such as Windows and macOS, worrying that foreign governments could be hoarding vulnerabilities that they could exploit to cripple the Chinese government’s computer networks.
61. Tim Cook praises China’s ‘critical’ role in Apple’s business
Ryan McMorrow, Thomas Hale, and Wang Xueqiao, Financial Times, March 20, 2024
62. Apple Held Talks with China’s Baidu Over AI for Its Devices
Raffaele Huang, Wall Street Journal, March 22, 2024
63. Senate plots next moves on TikTok
Ashley Gold, Axios, March 20, 2024
64. In One Key A.I. Metric, China Pulls Ahead of the U.S.: Talent
Paul Mozur and Cade Metz, New York Times, March 22, 2024
65. Has China Lost Its Taste for the iPhone?
Meaghan Tobin, Alexandra Stevenson, and Tripp Mickle, New York Times, March 25, 2024
66. China's WuXi AppTec shared US client's data with Beijing, US intelligence officials told senators
Michael Martina, Michael Erman, and Karen Freifeld, Reuters, March 28, 2024
Military and Security Threats
67. U.S. and Britain accuse China-linked hackers of ‘malicious’ cyber campaigns, announce sanctions
Ryan Browne, CNBC, March 25, 2024
68. A high-altitude tunnel is latest flashpoint in India-China border tensions
Simone McCarthy, CNN, March 22, 2024
69. Getting to World Class: Can China’s Military Persevere?
Joel Wuthnow, China Leadership Monitor, February 29, 2024
70. China’s Water Cannons Test US-Philippines Pact in Sea Feud
Andreo Calonzo, Bloomberg, March 25, 2024
71. Chinese Hackers Charged in Decade-Long Global Spying Rampage
Matt Burgess, Wired, March 25, 2024
72. Senators get "shocking" look at TikTok's spy potential
Stephen Neukam and Stef W. Kight, Axios, March 21, 2024
73. UK MPs to be given warnings on threat of Chinese cyber attacks
George Parker, Peter Campbell, and Lucy Fisher, Financial Times, March 24, 2024
74. China’s Dispute with Taiwan Is Playing Out Near This Tiny Island
Chris Buckley and Amy Chang Chien, New York Times, March 24, 2024
75. China says relations with Philippines at 'crossroads' amid maritime incidents
Neil Jerome Morales, Karen Lema, and Liz Lee, Reuters, March 25, 2024
One Belt, One Road Strategy
76. China’s tech-sharing pivot in belt and road is in its best interests
Asma Khalid, South China Morning Post, March 25, 2024
77. Suicide Bomber Kills 5 Chinese Workers in Pakistan
Salman Masood and Christina Goldbaum, New York Times, March 26, 2024
78. China faces US$50 billion shortfall in Southeast Asia as belt and road funds miss their mark
Kandy Wong, South China Morning Post, March 27, 2024
Opinion Pieces
79. A Propaganda Coup for Commies
James Freeman, Wall Street Journal, March 25, 2024
The thugs who run China’s dictatorship probably couldn’t believe their good fortune when the American who runs the taxpayer-backed World Bank Group showed up at China’s development forum over the weekend and lauded the communist regime as some sort of model.
According to the bank its President Ajay Banga said:
China’s remarkable journey stands as a testament to what’s possible.
In 1978, 770 million people in China lived on the razors edge of extreme poverty. Nearly every single person – 98 percent – in the rural countryside were below the poverty line.
But, the same year, China launched a determined strategy to embrace difficult reforms that fundamentally changed its development trajectory… In the decades that followed, China’s workforce grew by two-thirds, creating 315 million jobs – more than 8 million per year for 38 years straight.
This explosive job growth coincided with the country’s fastest period of poverty reduction in history.
It surely was a triumph for humanity when China took such giant leaps toward freedom and openness. One might have hoped that Mr. Banga had followed up this history with a forthright warning to the regime to stop its current march away from reform and toward greater communist control of minds and markets. Instead Mr. Banga offered only ambiguity, saying that “development is not a linear journey” and adding:
It’s marked by setbacks, missteps, and periods of incremental progress. This is true of all economies.
Looking at the China of today, we know what is possible. But we also know there is always another hill to climb and challenges to overcome – many are shared.
Then it was time for more tributes to the thugs who run the world’s largest police state:
We all desire a world where climate change is defeated, health care is available for young and old, and opportunities exist in rural communities as much as they do in urban cores. I know China’s leaders care deeply about these issues and can help drive the change.
For example, a decade ago, smog-filled skies darkened cities in China. The air quality was a constant source of concern, especially for those with children. It is a worry that is shared by parents in Indonesia and India, Mexico and Mongolia.
Today, there is a new reality in China.
Blue skies are more common, people are breathing better and living longer, and everyone from small children to elderly are able to enjoy being outdoors.
Mr. Banga went on about the supposed environmental champions who run China, but did not mention that even his World Bank acknowledges that China emits far more greenhouse gases than the United States. If this was a sign that Biden appointees are no longer obsessed with climate, then this counts as progress. But American businesses probably shouldn’t count on such a friendly attitude from Washington about their relatively small carbon footprints.
In his brief remarks Mr. Banga found more time to throw bouquets to Beijing:
The development journey is well traveled – every nation illuminating the trail for the next.
China has helped blaze the path. It has transitioned from taking World Bank grants – those reserved for the most in need – to giving as one of our largest donors.
It pulled from our knowledge bank and now feeds it – lessons that have been applied in Ethiopia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, Vietnam, and many more.
Sounds like China is just a global sweetheart—a giving, caring, loving neighbor. But many countries have sadly learned that development deals with China are often intended to secure strategic advantage—and don’t end well for the borrowers.
The Journal’s Ryan Dube and Gabriele Steinhauser reported last year on the “many Chinese-financed projects around the world plagued with construction flaws.” The authors noted:
During the past decade, China handed out a trillion dollars in international loans as part of Beijing’s Belt and Road initiative, intended to develop economic trade and expand China’s influence across Asia, Africa and Latin America. Those loans made Beijing the largest government lender to the developing world by far, with its loans totaling nearly as much as those of all other governments combined, according to the World Bank.
Yet China’s lending practices have been criticized by foreign leaders, economists and others, who say the program has contributed to debt crises in places like Sri Lanka and Zambia, and that many countries have limited ways to repay the loans. Some projects have also been called mismatches for a country’s infrastructure needs or damaging to the environment.
Now, low-quality construction on some of the projects risks crippling key infrastructure and saddling nations with even more costs for years to come as they try to remedy problems.
China is doing a lot of taking along with its dubious giving. Former World Bank executive director D.J. Nordquist wrote in The Hill last year:
A new report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) lays bare what was painfully obvious to me when I represented the U.S. on the board of directors at the World Bank: the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and its state-owned enterprises win the biggest slice of procurement for economic development projects, securing almost 30 percent of all funds.
The U.S., the bank’s largest shareholder thanks to generous taxpayer funding since the bank’s founding in 1945, is on the losing end of the ledger…
Not only does [China] win far more procurement than any other country, it also continues to take about $2 billion per year in World Bank loans to its government and private firms. It does so even as it lends to developing countries at non-concessional interest rates, on a bilateral basis through its own development banks. By some measures, China is the world’s largest source of development funding, despite remaining a significant recipient of World Bank funds and one of the top 10 debtors to the bank.
80. Lewis Carroll Goes to Taiwan
Nadia Schadlow, Wall Street Journal, March 25, 2024
In the face of Beijing’s coercion, simply maintaining the status quo requires the U.S. ‘to run as fast as we can.’
In “Through the Looking-Glass,” the Red Queen tells Alice: “My dear, here we must run as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And if you wish to go anywhere you must run twice as fast as that.” She might have been thinking of Taiwan.
During a recent trip there, I heard repeatedly from the country’s new leaders that they are committed to the status quo. According to a February poll from National Chengchi University’s Election Study Center, more than 80% of Taiwanese agree. But a contested geopolitical status quo doesn’t maintain itself. To do so, the U.S. and Taiwan must pursue sustained actions and counteractions.
Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen said “war is not an option” and Vice President Lai Ching-te, who succeeds Ms. Tsai in May, called for reopening dialogue with China to maintain the “cross-strait status quo.” Taiwan’s opposition party, the KMT, has also called for maintaining the current equilibrium.
But Beijing is working overtime to upend the existing order. Xi Jinping has said the “historical task of the complete reunification of the motherland must be fulfilled.” He reaffirmed this when he met with President Biden in November and during his New Year’s address reiterated his view that reunification with Taiwan was “inevitable.”
81. Beijing Is Ruining TikTok
Michael Schuman, The Atlantic, March 24, 2024
82. China’s growing influence in Indian Ocean is worrying. It harms the region’s stability
Sana Hashmi, The Print, March 27, 2024
83. China's Public Wants to Make a Living, Not War
Tao Wang, Foreign Policy, March 21, 2024
84. The US’ Waning Naval Dominance and China’s Surge Should Worry You
Hal Brands, AEI, March 21, 2024
85. The Oil Weapon Against Moscow
Andriy Yermak, Wall Street Journal, March 26, 2024
86. Don’t expect much from EU efforts in the Indo-Pacific
George Boone, The Strategist, March 27, 2024
87. China's maritime power cause for action and alarm
Jerry Hendrix, Asia Times, March 26, 2024