Friends,
Back in 1955, John F. Kennedy, the junior Senator from Massachusetts was contemplating a run for President and wrote the book Profiles in Courage for which he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1957 (despite not being a finalist for the prize and rumors that he wasn’t even the author, see Ted Sorensen, JFK’s speechwriter).
In that book, Kennedy described how eight U.S. Senators took brave stands to defend their principles and incurred the wrath of their own parties and criticism from the public.
Those eight have nothing on Zhan Zhang.
[Watch the Amnesty International video about her from October 2021 or this NBC News video from December 2021]
This week, the 40-year-old independent journalist who first livestreamed about COVID lockdowns in Wuhan and challenged the Party’s lies was supposed to be released from prison.
In May 2020, PRC police detained Zhan Zhang, charged her with the Orwellian crime of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble,” and sent her to prison, where she protested with hunger strikes over the past four years.
Her crime? Telling the Chinese people what their unelected rulers were doing to them.
Screenshot from YouTube of Zhan Zhang
When we think about what it means to be a hero or what it means to have courage, this woman’s face should come to mind.
She likely knew that her efforts to document the truth and to help her fellow citizens protect themselves, would incur the wrath of the Chinese Communist Party. She did it anyway.
She made the Party look bad.
She challenged the Party’s legitimacy and revealed the Party was lying to their own citizens and the world.
The Party ruined her life because a bunch of petty Communist Party elites cared more about their own reputations, than the well-being of others.
The Party sees itself as untouchable and beyond accountability… when brave Chinese citizens like Zhan challenge the Party and try to hold them accountable, the Party hammers them.
This is nothing new, the Chinese Communist Party, like other Leninist regimes, places the interests of the Party elite above the interests of their country and their citizens. I’ve referenced this before, but Philip Selznick’s book The Organizational Weapon: A Study of Bolshevik Strategy and Tactics is a good primer on the Party’s pathologies (you can download the 1952 version of Selznick’s book here, when it was a RAND Report, or you can order the 2014 update in paperback here). Selznick’s book describes the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), but his book retains explanatory power for what we see the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) doing today.
As of this writing, no one has heard from Zhan, nor is there any confirmation that she has been released from prison. The Chinese Communist Party is likely still holding her in custody out of fear that she might tell her story.
My recommendation: Tell her story.
The worst thing we can do is to let the Party memory hole her.
Chinese Woman Jailed for Reporting on Covid Is Set to Be Freed – Vivian Wang, New York Times, May 13, 2024
Chinese journalist imprisoned for her Covid reporting due to be released after four years. But will she be free? – Nectar Gan, CNN, May 13, 2024
Status of Chinese citizen journalist who reported on COVID unknown on day of expected prison release – Huizhong Wu, Associated Press, May 13, 2024
Fears grow over delay of Wuhan whistleblower Zhang Zhan's release from prison – Australian Broadcasting Channel, May 13, 2024
Chinese Journalist Zhang Zhan, Jailed For Reportage On Wuhan COVID Outbreak, To Be Released – Danita Yadev, Outlook India, May 13, 2024
Concerns grow for Chinese citizen journalist after supposed jail release – Amy Hawkins, The Guardian, May 15, 2024
Worry as Wuhan blogger's release remains unclear – Kelly Ng and Joel Guinto, BBC, May 16, 2024
US raises ‘deep concerns’ over disappearance of Chinese citizen journalist who reported on Covid-19 outbreak – Hayley Wong, SCMP, May 17, 2024
On the Case of Zhang Zhan – U.S. Mission China, May 17, 2024
o The United States is deeply concerned over reports that PRC citizen journalist Ms. Zhang Zhan has disappeared following her expected release from Shanghai Women’s Prison on May 13 after four years in prison on charges associated with her reporting on the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan. The United States has repeatedly expressed our serious concerns about the arbitrary nature of her detention and authorities’ mistreatment of her. We reiterate our call for the PRC to respect the human rights of Ms. Zhang, including by immediately ending the restrictive measures that she and all journalists in the PRC face, which include surveillance, censorship, harassment, and intimidation. Journalists in the PRC should be safe and able to report freely.
China: RSF urges for release of ailing detained Covid-19 journalist, hospitalised again – Reporters Without Borders, January 9, 2023
Zhang Zhan's prison letter offers hope and fear – William Tang, Deutsche Welle, January 5, 2023
Chinese Activist Paying Terrible Price for Public Health Advocacy – Human Rights Watch, September 11, 2023
A reporter risked her life to show the world Covid in Wuhan. Now she may not survive jail. – NBC News, December 18, 2021
Thanks for reading!
Matt
MUST READ
1. The Harvard man who became Xi Jinping’s favourite academic
Charles Parton, The Spectator, May 13, 2024
Xi Jinping is a busy man. He holds down three jobs. As General Secretary of the Chinese Communist party (CCP), he rules 1.4 billion people and disciplines 100 million party members; as Chairman of the Military Commission, he commands and reforms the world’s largest army; and as president, he glad-hands a succession of Beijing-bound heads of states. In his spare time he has also authored ten books.
So you can be sure that when he carves out time for a separate meeting with a hitherto unremarkable American academic, it is not without purpose. Graham Allison, in case you have not heard of him, is an historian with a chair at Harvard. He met with Xi Jinping and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi as part of a delegation of American business executives earlier this year.
Allison is clearly not a bad man. If you read his outpourings on his recent visit to China, he sincerely wants a world of peace and cooperation. Who doesn’t? But the party has long experience of playing on liberal heart strings. And when a not so humble Harvard professor finds himself shaking the hand of the Chinese President, it is flattery hard to resist.
Allison’s intellectual contribution is based on a sentence in Thucydides’ Histories: ‘It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this instilled in Sparta that made war inevitable.’ He has elevated this into a historical principle, and publicised his fear that it characterises the relationship between the rising power China (Athens) and the established hegemon the United States (Sparta).
But unlike Thucydides, Allison may have failed to ‘seek truth from facts’ – to use the slogan so beloved of Chairman Mao and his successors. His interpretation of the ‘father of history’ (Thucydides merits the title more than Herodotus) is questionable. Some classical scholars believe that the sentence upon which Allison focuses is a later interpolation. It certainly fits ill with the rest of the narrative of Histories. By 454 BC the Athenian empire had already risen: Athens ruled the waves, Sparta the land.
COMMENT – I think it’s great that other writers are pointing out Graham Allison’s work and putting it in the proper context.
Some might even argue that Allison is a “useful idiot” in the classic Cold War sense of the term. Here’s the Merriam-Webster definition:
useful idiot noun
1: a naive or credulous person who can be manipulated or exploited to advance a cause or political agenda
It is one task of the KGB [in 1982] to apply its skills of secrecy and deception to projecting the Soviet party's influence. This it does through contacts with legal Communist Parties abroad, with groups sympathetic to Soviet goals, with do-gooders of the type that Lenin once described as "useful idiots." —The Wall Street Journal
I have decided NOT to use the term “useful idiot” because that’s really harsh. For my take on Professor Allison's work over the past decade see the March 31 issue of this newsletter titled “On Becoming a Borrowed Boat.”
The controversy over Professor Allison’s work and the way that he is increasingly identified as a tool of influence has forced some of Beijing’s mouthpieces to respond.
Here on Substack, the Beijing-based think tank CCG (Center for China and Globalization) publishes Pekingnology and this week they put out an eye-brow raising piece titled “Xi Jinping on the Thucydides Trap” in which they took issue with Charles Parton’s article in The Spectator and argued that Xi Jinping doesn’t believe in the “Thucydides Trap”… by quoting Xi on numerous occasions referring to the “Thucydides Trap.”
[If you’re confused by that, you’re not alone… you have to do some serious mental gymnastics to stay on the right side of the Party’s propaganda]
CCG argues that Xi and the Chinese Communist Party are only responding to an idea that is out there in the world which they are not responsible for (the subtitle to their article is: “Beijing's engagement with Graham Allison is, frankly, damage control”).
OK… so why is CCG the one publishing Graham Allison’s work?
And why is the founder and president of CCG (Henry Huiyao Wang) the author of the latest book on the “Thucydides’s Trap”?
Screenshot from the CCG website announcing the book launch for “Escaping the Thucydides’s Trap” on March 22, 2024.
Screenshot from the CCG website of the event hosted at CCG in which the founder and president of CCG discussed CCG’s new book on the Thucydides’s Trap with Allison (full video here).
Also, here is the founder and president of CCG with Allison on the PRC State Broadcaster, CGTN, for a 30-minute discussion on the Thucydides Trap (full video here):
CCG President Huiyao Wand and Graham Allison on CGTN on April 3, 2024.
According to Zichen Wang, CCG’s Director for International Communications and the editor of the Pekingnology newsletter, the CCP doesn’t support the Thucydides Trap thesis and they are just doing “damage control” for the ideas it represents.
Zichen Wang asserts that Beijing objects to the Thucydides Trap thesis and instead “Beijing wants to control the damage that it fears the theory has done or will do, and its rationale is that first the theory may not hold at all, and if it indeed holds then China just doesn’t fit into the model.”
Huh?
To be honest, the Party (and its mouthpiece CCG) has picked a really odd way to downplay or minimize a theory they say they don’t agree with. Let’s tick off the ways the Party is supposedly “minimizing” the Thucydides Trap theory:
CCP leaders meet with Allison on a regular basis;
Xi Jinping refers to Allison’s theory on multiple occasions (as Zichen Wang documents in his piece);
·The president and founder of a CCP-controlled think tank writes a new book on the Thucydides Trap;
The largest State-controlled publisher in the PRC publishes and distributes the new book on the Thucydides Trap;
That same CCP-controlled think tank holds a giant book launch event and invites Allison to speak about his theory in Beijing during the China Development Forum and then distributes it on multiple media outlets;
Xi Jinping invites Graham Allison to be the only academic to meet with him during an event with American business leaders;
The State-controlled broadcaster CGTN airs 30-minute discussions about the Thucydides Trap with Graham Allison; and
The PRC Ambassador to the United States does a fire-side chat with Graham Allison at Harvard University.
I’m deeply skeptical that the Party’s intention is to refute this theory as Zichen Wang argues… the Party clearly wants to amplify it because it helps them blame the United States for causing the tension in the relationship. But now that folks are starting to see Allison as a “borrowed boat,” his theory isn’t as useful to them as it once was.
CCG’s effort to resurrect the trope of the Thucydides Trap has backfired and now CCG is backpedaling.
One last point on CCG (Center for China and Globalization).
Reading the “About Us” webpage on their English language website is absolutely hilarious. The organization asserts with sincerity that it “is not an organ of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Chinese government” and that it is entirely funded by “Chinese private sector companies.”
If you click on the Chinese language version of their website, you find none of these assertions of independence from the Chinese Communist Party or the Chinese Government. Clearly the impression CCG wants foreigners to get is different from the way they want to portray themselves domestically.
When you read their annual reports (none of which are available on their English language website or in English), you get a very different impression. CCG’s job is to tell the Party’s story well with the veneer of independence that being a “think tank” gives them.
From CCG’s own Chinese language report memorializing 15 years of CCG:
自成立以来，CCG 递交政策建言近千篇，获得中央领导、国家部委领导批示 上百次。
[Google Translate] “Since its establishment, CCG has submitted nearly a thousand policy suggestions and received instructions from central leaders and national ministries and commissions leaders hundreds of times.” (page 34, 15 Years of CCG)
CCG 是中联部“一带一路”智库联盟理事单位，
[Google Translate] “CCG is a governing unit of the “Belt and Road” Think Tank Alliance of the International Department of the CPC Central Committee.” (page 35, 15 Years of CCG)
CCG 专家团队包括由学术机构代表组成的学术委员会专家，由商务部、外交部等政
[Google Translate] “The CCG expert team includes experts from the academic committee composed of representatives from academic institutions, and is composed of government officials such as the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.” (page 37, 15 Years of CCG)
CCG 都在积极通过智库外交“破局”,走访美国各大智库和商会，
[Google Translate] “The CCG is actively using think tank diplomacy to “break the Bureau" and visited major think tanks and chambers of commerce in the United States.” (page 40, 15 Years of CCG)
This last quote is illuminating… the CCG’s purpose is to conduct “think tank diplomacy” on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party to influence U.S. think tanks and chambers of commerce (in particular CCG names the targets its seeking to influence: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the U.S.-China Business Council (USCBC), the National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC), and the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations).
2023 年是全面贯彻落实党的二十大精神的开局之年, 是实施“十四五”规划承上启下的关键一年。站在新的历史节点，作为中国特色新型智库的探索者与实践者，CCG 将不负时代所托，一如既往地参与和推动中国的改革开放进程，为中国的全球化之路提供智力支撑，为中国引领新一轮全球化贡献智库智慧，
[Google Translate] “2023 is the first year to comprehensively implement the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, and is a critical year for the implementation of the 14th Five-Year Plan. Standing at a new historical juncture, as an explorer and practitioner of new think tanks with Chinese characteristics, CCG will live up to the trust of the times and continue to participate in and promote China's reform and opening up process, provide intellectual support for China's globalization, and contribute think tank wisdom to China's leadership in a new round of globalization.” (page 61, 15 Years of CCG)
Above is the last paragraph of 15 Years of CCG, in which the organization closes with its most important goal: provide support for the “spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China” and implement the 14th Five-Year Plan.
I could go on with more examples, but you get the point.
The CCG is anything but an “independent think tank,” it is an entity that is completely controlled and dominated by the Chinese Communist Party. The CCG exists to serve as a front organization for the Party when the veneer of independence serves the Party’s goals.
2. China: Overseas students face harassment and surveillance in campaign of transnational repression
Amnesty International, May 13, 2024
Key Points:
China-based family members of Chinese students in Europe and North America targeted in retaliation for students’ overseas activism
Students face ‘surveillance’ at protests and online
Universities urged to combat threats to academic freedom and human rights
Chinese and Hong Kong students studying abroad are living in fear of intimidation, harassment and surveillance as Chinese authorities seek to prevent them from engaging with ‘sensitive’ or political issues while overseas, Amnesty International said in a new report published today.
Students based in Europe and North America interviewed for the report, ‘On my campus, I am afraid’, described being photographed and followed at protests in their host cities, while many said their families in China had been targeted and threatened by police in connection with the students’ activism overseas.
“The testimonies gathered in this report paint a chilling picture of how the Chinese and Hong Kong governments seek to silence students even when they are thousands of miles from home, leaving many students living in fear,” said Sarah Brooks, Amnesty International’s China Director.
“The Chinese authorities’ assault on human rights activism is playing out in the corridors and classrooms of the many universities that host Chinese and Hong Kong students. The impact of China’s transnational repression poses a serious threat to the free exchange of ideas that is at the heart of academic freedom, and governments and universities must do more to counter it.”
COMMENT – Universities need to cut their ties to the PRC.
For too long, University Administrators and Faculty have enabled these abuses of Chinese students by turning a blind eye to them.
Back when I was at the White House, I would engage with university leadership on this problem, hosting them for discussions at the White House and going to their campuses to share what we saw happening.
At one such event with an Ivy League University (I won’t name which one), a senior faculty member loudly denounced U.S. policy towards the PRC in front of a room full of his colleagues and claimed that it was Washington that was endangering PRC students.
At the end of the event when everyone had left the meeting room, that same faculty member came up to me privately to ask for assistance. One of his PRC students was being threatened by the Chinese Communist Party and that the student’s family members in the PRC were being coerced to put pressure on the student.
When I pointed out that this is exactly the kind of behavior we were describing during the large group meeting and that he had publicly refuted, he simply gave a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ and claimed that if he acknowledged what Beijing was doing in front of his colleagues, then even more of his students would be endangered.
I was flabbergasted.
3. Chinese Woman Jailed for Reporting on Covid Is Set to Be Freed
Vivian Wang, New York Times, May 13, 2024
Zhang Zhan, thought to be the first person in China imprisoned for documenting the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in the country, was expected to be released on Monday, after serving a four-year sentence.
But in a sign of how eager the Chinese government remains to suppress public discussion of the outbreak, it was unclear on Monday evening whether Ms. Zhang, 40, had actually been set free. The lawyer who represented Ms. Zhang during her trial, Zhang Keke (the two are not related), said he could not reach her mother all day. Reached by phone, officials at the Shanghai prison administration declined to comment.
“Even though she will have served her sentence, there are doubts regarding the Chinese regime’s willingness to give her back her freedom,” Reporters Without Borders, the international media watchdog group, said in a statement several days before her expected release. The group, which gave Ms. Zhang a press freedom award in 2021, noted that journalists released from imprisonment in China are often kept under surveillance.
4. Lending Prestige to Persecution: How Foreign Judges are Undermining Hong Kong's Freedoms and Why They Should Quit
The Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation, May 14, 2024
A vestige of British colonial rule allows common law judges from outside of Hong Kong to serve on the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal. There are currently nine foreign non-permanent judges (“NPJs”) serving on the court from Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Historically, under the Basic Law, the presence of overseas NPJs has benefited the Hong Kong judiciary and the standing of the Court. Since the introduction of the National Security Law and Article 23 legislation in Hong Kong, however, the legal system in Hong Kong has been reshaped to serve the Chinese Communist Party’s authoritarian regime. At this point, the overseas NPJs provide little if any benefit to the remaining vestiges of the city’s rights-based order. Instead, the Hong Kong authorities are using the prestige of the retired judges who sit on the Court of Final Appeal to legitimise their human rights abuses and the undermining of Hong Kong’s rule of law.
This report makes the case for why the overseas NPJs should resign. These judges purport to be committed to constitutionalism and human rights, but as Hong Kong’s authoritarian regime and court system have systematically infringed on the rights of Hongkongers in recent years, they are now merely lending their and their nations’ reputations to legitimise the crackdown.
COMMENT – It is time for the Commonwealth to withdraw their judges. The only purpose those nine serve is to provide legitimacy to what the CCP is doing to Hong Kong.
5. The Vatican’s Gamble with Beijing Is Costing China’s Catholics
Francis X. Rocca, Atlantic, May 14, 2024
Ten years ago, Pope Francis became the first pope to enter Chinese airspace, expressing his eagerness to visit China. His conciliatory approach has stabilized the Catholic Church in China but has also involved accepting restrictions on religious freedom, potentially undermining the Vatican's credibility. Francis negotiated a 2018 agreement allowing cooperation between the Vatican and Beijing on appointing bishops, aiming to prevent schism. The deal, details of which remain secret, is up for renewal this fall and gives the pope the final say on appointments, contingent on Beijing's support.
COMMENT – Pope Francis and his team have done a poor job of protecting Chinese Catholics. I fear the Vatican will switch recognition to the PRC in the future and sacrifice their moral standing.
6. VIDEO – Investigating China's illegal operations on foreign soil
Four Corners, ABC News, May 13, 2024
For the first time, a former spy for China's secret police, known as Eric, has gone public, revealing covert operations targeting dissidents in countries like Australia, Canada, and India.
Eric exposes the tactics used to surveil, silence, and kidnap those deemed enemies of the state. He details the secret police's methods, including cover companies and tracking techniques, risking his safety to reveal China's global intelligence activities.
COMMENT – Australian journalists continue to do an outstanding job at uncovering the malign activities of the Chinese Communist Party. This is a fairly lengthy report, but it is worth watching all the way through.
7. VIDEO – Defending Taiwan: A roadmap for the urgent policy steps to prevent war
Matt Pottinger, Tom Tugendhat, Mark Sedwell, Policy Exchange, May 16, 2024
Former Deputy National Security Advisor Matt Pottinger and the UK Security Minister Tom Tugendhat discuss how to deter the PRC from attacking Taiwan. (Starts at minute 13:39)
COMMENT – Matt, Tom, and Mark do a great job in this panel discussion. Matt Pottinger’s new book, which I contributed to as the co-author of one of the chapters, will be released soon.
You can pre-order a copy of the book here.
8. VIDEO – No Substitute for Victory: Mike Gallagher on Winning the Competition with China
Mike Gallagher and John Walters, Hudson Institute, May 16, 2024
Former Congressman Gallagher discusses the challenge posed by the PRC.
COMMENT – Watch this in full.
Mike Gallagher has been concentrating on this challenge for years and it is worth hearing his thoughts.
For some background, here are a few of his articles on this subject:
The Sources of CCP Conduct – Mike Gallagher, The National Interest, September 2019
Taiwan Can’t Wait: What America Must Do To Prevent a Successful Chinese Invasion – Mike Gallagher, Foreign Affairs, February 2022
Why America Forgets—and China Remembers—the Korean War: The CCP’s Dangerous Historical Distortions and the Struggle Over Taiwan – Mike Gallagher and Aaron MacLean, Foreign Affairs, July 2023
No Substitute for Victory: America’s Competition With China Must Be Won, Not Managed – Matt Pottinger and Mike Gallagher, Foreign Affairs, April 2024
9. VIDEO – What China Remembers About the Cultural Revolution, And What It Wants to Forget
Tania Branigan and Glenn Tiffert, Hoover Institution, May 10, 2024
The devastating movement unleashed by Mao in 1966, which claimed around two million lives and saw tens of millions hounded, shapes China to this day. Yet in a country where leaders have long seen history as a political tool, the Cultural Revolution is a particularly sensitive subject. How does the Chinese Communist Party control discussion of the topic? And how has an era which turned the nation upside down been used to maintain the political status quo? This is an event hosted by Hoover’s project on China’s Global Sharp Power, Stanford University’s Center for East Asian Studies, and the Department of History.
Here's an excerpt from Tania Branigan remarks –
“It's often suggested that the Party continued to laud Mao because it could not afford a more honest reckoning with the PRC's founder, he is China's Lenin and Stalin in one.
I actually think it's more fundamental than that.
If you allow the public to judge the past, then why can they not judge the present?
If they can turn upon their former leader, why can't they turn against you?
What's more unexpected perhaps is that the memory of the Cultural Revolution has also been useful to China's leaders in the longer term. The most striking recent example has been XI Jinping's reinvention of his seven years of rural misery as an educated youth into his creation story.
This is the one part of the Cultural Revolution that is not only acknowledged, but even applauded by the official media. Over time his ordeal has become detached from its roots in political fanaticism and repackaged instead as a “Coming of Age” Tale in which the young hero discovers himself through honest toil, shows his grit and love for the people, and is humbled by the humanity of the peasantry.
But the deeper usefulness of the Cultural Revolution has been in shoring up the Party's rule.
It was a disaster so undeniable and overwhelming that it has come to stand for the dangers of any kind of change, any threat to rigid Party control.
If young people are given their head. If subordinates can challenge their leaders.
Then this is the result: Chaos.
This understanding of the era is only possible if it's not faced full square. It must be veiled because the Party's responsibility for the disaster can't be dwelt upon. It's a bogey man which is all the more potent because it's shrouded, because it dwells in the shadows, and this vagueness also allows the era to be repurposed as the political occasion demands.
Though the disgraced quasi-Marxist leader of Chongqing, Bo Xilai was tarred by Illusions to the Cultural Revolution. But it was also invoked to attack the student demonstrations in Tiananmen Square in 1989 and pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong in 2014.
The message is simply that any deviation from the status quo, whether left or right, will result in turmoil and that only the Party's tight grip on society on the unpredictable and dangerous masses can protect the country from reckless and lethal instability.
An era of turmoil created by the party has been used to justify and buttress the party's rule.”
COMMENT – Tania Branigan’s book, Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution is excellent and I recommend reading it.
The Party has spent the last 50 years memory holing the Cultural Revolution. The Party simply cannot face up to what it did to the Chinese people. The turmoil, the devastation, and the poverty that resulted from the first three decades of Maoist rule cannot be acknowledged by the Party.
Much of the Party’s efforts to amplify the narrative of the Century of Humiliation (1839-1949), in which outside powers abused China before the CCP came to power, is used to distract Chinese citizens from the crushing poverty and starvation caused by the Party itself between 1949 and 1979. The Chinese people were poor and hungry in the 1970s and 1980s entirely because of the Party’s criminal mismanagement of the country.
Chinese citizens of the 1970s and 1980s might have looked at their counterparts in Japan and South Korea and asked themselves a question: Given that both Japan and South Korea were just as devastated in the late 1940s and early 1950s as China was, why are they so much more prosperous? The difference lies in the political leadership, not what foreigners did or did not do.
Escaping responsibility for the Party’s own mistakes and finding someone else to blame is a top priority of the Party’s leadership. Repurposing the Cultural Revolution, which Mao alone caused, is critical to the Party’s mission to hold on to power at all costs.
10. VIDEO – Reimagining Globalization
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Ravi Agrawal, Foreign Policy, May 16, 2024
In the last two decades, with the global financial crisis and then the COVID-19 pandemic, countries began to worry globalization would expose them to too many risks. Nations are turning inward; many are investing in industrial policies, near-shoring, and economic independence instead of the integration and free trade that marked the second half of the 20th century.
Should the world reconsider the case for globalization? What role can trade cooperation play when it comes to clean energy and reducing inequality? And how will growing isolationism affect emerging economies?
COMMENT – The WTO Director General is detached from reality; she heads a dying organization that limps along and becomes less relevant each day. Globalization after the Cold War didn’t happen because of the WTO, it happened because there was an alignment of geopolitical interests by the world’s leading powers. Those interests are no longer aligned which means the WTO is irrelevant.
It does not have the power to enforce the rules it claims to uphold. And as other countries have grown in power and influence, they have refused to carry the burden of maintaining the system that the WTO represents.
You might expect at this point the conversation would shift to identify which country has done the most to destroy this beneficial system (side-eye at the PRC)… but this is a conversation led by Ravi Agrawal, so you’d be wrong.
At minute 22:15, Ravi shifts the conversation to his favorite theme: Isn’t America at fault for all of this? (Quote: “I’m wondering how much of all of this right now, as you’re sitting at the WTO, how much do you blame the United States for where we are?”).
The WTO Director General was diplomatic enough not to completely take the bait, but it’s clear that she primarily blames “developed countries” for the problems.
Authoritarianism
11. New Player in Chinese Communist Influence Body Has Extensive NYC Political Ties
Jimmy Quinn, National Review, May 10, 2024
12. Mainland China targets Taiwanese influencers for punishment over ‘fake and negative’ comments
Vanessa Cai, South China Morning Post, May 15, 2024
13. Defending Taiwan by Defending Ukraine
Jaushieh Joseph Wu, Foreign Affairs, May 9, 2024
14. All Chinese high school pupils forced to do military training
Richard Spencer, Australian, May 9, 2024
15. Former spy for China's secret police reveals operations targeting dissidents in Australia and overseas
Echo Hu, Elise Potaka, and Dylan Welch, ABC News, May 12, 2024
16. Vladimir Putin blasts west ahead of state visit to Beijing
Joe Leahy and Max Seddon, Financial Times, May 15, 2024
17. China-Russia: an economic ‘friendship’ that could rattle the world
Joe Leahy, Kai Waluszewski, and Max Seddon, Financial Times, May 14, 2024
18. China accused of ‘transnational repression’ of students
Peter Foster, Sun You, Andrew Jack, and Chan Ho-him, Financial Times, May 13, 2024
19. China recruits Mandarin-speaking teachers to move to Inner Mongolia
Qian Lang, RFA, May 6, 2024
20. Uyghur official jailed after refusing land acquisition
Shohret Hoshur, RFA, May 10, 2024
21. Chinese Woman Jailed for Reporting on Covid Set to be Freed
Vivian Wang, New York Times, May 13, 2024
Environmental Harms
22. EU tariffs on Chinese EVs could backfire, German car bosses warn
Nick Carey and Christina Amann, Reuters, May 8, 2024
23. Is China Committing Environmental Crimes in the South China Sea?
John McManus, The Diplomat, March 1, 2024
24. China Takes Advantage of Cheap Gas and Coal to Rebuild Stocks
Bloomberg, May 12, 2024
25. China’s Illegal Fishing Is Also a Human Rights Issue
Steve Trent, World Politics Review, May 6, 2024
26. Chinese fishing fleets in Indian Ocean accused of abuses
Yuchen Li and Chia-Chun Yeh, DW, May 4, 2024
Foreign Interference and Coercion
27. Japan, South Korea, China seek to ease friction at trilateral summit
Rieko Miki, Nikkei Asia, May 15, 2024
28. Malaysia’s appetite for oil and gas puts it on collision course with China
Rebecca Tan, Washington Post, May 11, 2024
29. Europeans Need to Trump-Proof China Policy
Liana Fix and Zongyuan Zoe Liu, Foreign Policy, May 14, 2024
30. Peru Learns to Read the Fine Print in China Deals
Elisabeth Braw, Foreign Policy, May 13, 2024
31. The illicit trade with China fuelling Mozambique's insurgency
Angela Henshall, BBC, May 15, 2024
32. Chinese Foreign Agent was Behind New York Parade with Eric Adams, Emails Show
Didi Kirsten Tatlow, Newsweek, May 12, 2024
33. The Lopsided Reality of the China-Russia Relationship
Georgi Kantchev, Wall Street Journal, May 15, 2024
34. China Deploys Dozens of Ships to Block Philippine Protest Flotilla
Chris Buckley and Camille Elemia, New York Times, May 14, 2024
35. Peru port conflict escalates as Chinese firm insists on original terms
Marco Aquino, Reuters, May 7, 2024
Human Rights and Religious Persecution
36. China Is Reversing Its Crackdown on Some Religions, but Not All
Ian Johnson, Council on Foreign Relations, May 14, 2024
37. Two Men Persecuted in Xi’s China Tried to Escape. Only One Succeeded.
Chun Han Wong, Wall Street Journal, May 10, 2024
38. Uyghur woman who complained about land grab arrested by authorities in Xinjiang
Shohret Hoshur, RFA, May 15, 2024
A Uyghur woman was arrested last month after she posted a video on social media complaining that authorities had seized her land in Xinjiang, leaving her without means to eke out a living, the security director of her village said.
The woman, identified only as Belikiz, 35, from Astana village in Kumul, called Hami in Chinese, said authorities confiscated her land at the end of 2023 to implement a policy of “concentrating lands in the hands of authorities.”
She expressed despair over the Chinese government’s unwillingness to resolve the issue in the video on Douyin, a Chinese video-sharing platform.
“Even if the land was allocated to us by the government, we’ve invested 3-4 years cultivating it,” she says in the video. “Why won’t the government advocate for us farmers? If you doubt my words, just look at those machines tearing up our farmlands.”
“How are we supposed to sustain our livelihoods and send our children to school?” she asked. “Isn’t there a country that can support us? Is there no organization we can turn to for help?”
‘Systematic confiscation’
For years, authorities in Xinjiang have seized land and property from Uyghurs to make way for development projects run by Han Chinese migrants. Those who lose land often have little or no recourse for adequate compensation or justice because of high levels of collusion between local officials and developers.
Uyghurs complain that the migrants have displaced them from their traditional homeland and deprived them of financial opportunities under harsh Beijing rule.
Police quickly deleted the video from Douyin not long after it was uploaded and arrested Belikiz on April 15, said Astana village’s security director, who declined to be named out of fear of retribution.
He said he learned of the woman’s arrest about 20 days later and that authorities apprehended her because of a complaint letter she previously submitted to the government about the issue.
It was unclear whether her arrest was directly related to the video addressing the land seizure, he added.
“The systematic confiscation of land from Uyghurs has been an ongoing issue for a long time,” said a Uyghur former police officer who now lives Sweden. “We owe our insight into these injustices to the courage of individuals who bravely share their stories through videos like these.”
39. The escaped dissident still pursued decades on by China
Gordon Corera, BBC, May 12, 2024
40. Lawyer debunks China’s historical narrative of control over Xinjiang
Alim Seytoff, RFA, May 8, 2024
41. Uyghur college grad sentenced to 5 years in prison for disturbing social order
Shohret Hoshur, RFA, May 16, 2024
42. Repression of Falun Gong Continues Among Ethnic Korean Minority in Liaoning
Yang Feng, Bitter Winter, May 14, 2024
Liaoning is home to one of the oldest ethnic Korean community in China, whose origins date back to the 13th century. Today, some 250,000 ethnic Koreans live in the province.
While CCP propaganda represents Liaoning’s Koreans as happy and “patriotic,” in fact expressions of their Korean identity that go beyond the festivals staged for propaganda and touristic purposes are carefully monitored. A special department of the United Front keeps watch on any possible deviation from CCP orthodox “patriotic” reconstruction of the history of Koreans in China and for relations with South Korean organizations, including Christian and other churches.
Interestingly, together with other residents of Liaoning, some ethnic Koreans there found comfort in Falun Gong. A bloody persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in Liaoning has particularly targeted over the years Xinbin Manchu Autonomous County under the jurisdiction of the prefecture-level city of Fushun, where practitioners have been arrested, tortured, and in some cases killed.
43. Taiwan’s Democracy Is Thriving in China’s Shadow
David Sacks, CFR, May 13, 2024
Amidst China’s growing military, economic, and diplomatic pressure on Taiwan and the attendant rising awareness of the risk of a cross-strait conflict, Taiwan is often solely viewed as a flashpoint or the frontline in a geopolitical struggle between China and the United States. A 2021 cover of the Economist, for instance, went so far as to label Taiwan “the most dangerous place on earth.”
As international attention returns to Taiwan for its presidential inauguration on May 20, with keen interest in what president-elect William Lai will say on cross-strait relations, it is worth taking a step back to appreciate Taiwan’s democratic achievements. Under four decades since martial law was lifted and under three decades after its first democratic presidential election, Taiwan has emerged as one of the world’s strongest democracies, an achievement all the more remarkable considering the existential threat that the island faces.
Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage
44. US confronts China over Volt Typhoon cyber espionage
Zeba Siddiqui, Reuters, May 8, 2024
U.S. officials confronted the Chinese government in Beijing last month about a sweeping cyber espionage campaign through which Chinese hackers have broken in to dozens of American critical infrastructure organizations, a senior U.S. cyber official said.
Under the campaign named Volt Typhoon, American officials say China aims to leverage the access it has gained into U.S. organizations in the event of a war or conflict - a nod to escalating U.S.-China tensions over Taiwan. The Chinese have previously dismissed such allegations as groundless.
COMMENT - I really wish we would do more than just confront them rhetorically.
45. Comac’s Homegrown Aircraft Goes Global
Nathaniel Sher, Jamestown Foundation, May 10, 2024
46. Half of companies see China economy worsening this year: Japan chamber
Shunsuke Tabeta, Nikkei Asia, May 15, 2024
47. Small, well-built Chinese EV called the Seagull poses a big threat to the US auto industry
Tom Krisher and Ken Moritsugu, Associated Press, May 13, 2024
48. Statement on the President’s Decision Prohibiting the Acquisition by MineOne Cloud Computing Investment I L.P. of Real Estate, and the Operation of a Cryptocurrency Mining Facility, in Close Proximity to Francis E. Warren Air Force Base
U.S. Department of Treasury, May 13, 2024
49. USTR Announces New Section 301 Tariffs on Chinese Products
David J. Ross, Jeffrey I. Kessler, Lauren Mandell, and Neena Shenai, WilmerHale, May 14, 2024
50. U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to Take Further Action on China Tariffs After Releasing Statutory Four-Year Review
Office of the United States Trade Representative, May 14, 2024
51. Expanding the Tool Kit to Counter China's Economic Coercion
Cynthia Cook, Gregory Sanders, Alexander Holderness, John Schaus, Nicholas Velazquez, Audrey Aldisert, Henry Carroll, and Emily Hardesty, CSIS, May 6, 2024
52. Experts React: Energy and Trade Implications of Tariffs on Chinese Imports
Joseph Majkut, William Alan Reinsch, Scott Kennedy, Emily Benson, Gracelin Baskaran, Jane Nakano, and Quill Robinson, CSIS, May 14, 2024
53. China, Biotechnology, and BGI
Anna Puglisi and Chryssa Rask, Center for Security and Emerging Technology, May 8, 2024
54. China’s Top Diplomat Says US Tariffs Show Loss of ‘Sanity’
Bloomberg, May 15, 2024
55. China Has Gotten the Trade War It Deserves
Michael Schuman, Atlantic, May 15, 2024
56. Honda scales down production workforce in China as sales slump
Shizuka Tanabe, Nikkei Asia, May 15, 2024
57. Biden Levies Sweeping Tariffs on China, Intensifying Trade Fight with Trump
Andrew Duehren and Andrew Restuccia, Wall Street Journal, May 14, 2024
58. With America Off-Limits, China EV Makers Aim to Conquer Rest of World
Yoko Kubota and Sha Hua, Wall Street Journal, May 15, 2024
59. China ‘dwarfs’ US investments in EU neighbourhood countries
Raphael Minder, Financial Times, May 14, 2024
60. China’s SMIC warns of fiercer price war for less advanced chips
Cheng Ting-Fang and Lauly Li, Financial Times, May 14, 2024
61. Why Washington’s new tariffs on Chinese clean tech goods matter
Aime Williams, Financial Times, May 14, 2024
62. Few Chinese Electric Cars Are Sold in U.S., but Industry Fears a Flood
Neal E. Boudette, New York Times, May 15, 2024
63. 'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger,' China trolls new US tariffs
Joe Cash and Ryan Woo, Reuters, May 15, 2024
Cyber & Information Technology
64. China's biggest chipmaker SMIC warns of 'fierce' competition as it misses quarterly profit expectations
Sheila Chiang, CNBC, May 10, 2024
65. Why young Russian women appear so eager to marry Chinese men
The Economist, May 9, 2024
66. YouTube to block Hong Kong protest anthem videos after court order
Jeffrey Dastin and James Pomfret, Reuters, May 14, 2024
67. Senate Group Recommends Spending Tens of Billions of Dollars on AI
Katy Stech Ferek and Deepa Seetharaman, Wall Street Journal, May 15, 2024
68. Chinese firms make headway in producing high bandwidth memory for AI chipsets
Fanny Potkin and Eduardo Baptista, Reuters, May 14, 2024
Military and Security Threats
69. Japan defense chief urges higher security after drone video of warship posted on China social media
Mari Yamaguchi, Associated Press, May 10, 2024
70. China’s spy threat is growing, but the West has struggled to keep up
Gordon Corera, BBC, May 15, 2024
71. US aims to stay ahead of China in using AI to fly fighter jets, navigate without GPS and more
Tara Copp, Associated Press, May 12, 2024
72. China suspected of massive cyberattack on database of UK armed forces personnel
Alexander Butler, Independent, May 7, 2024
73. China Suspected in Major NATO Member's Defense Hack
John Feng, Newsweek, May 7, 2024
74. Former US Marine pilot arrested in Australia worked with Chinese hacker, lawyer says
Kirsty Needham, Reuters, May 13, 2024
75. A Domain of Great Powers: The Strategic Role of Space in Achieving China’s Dream of National Rejuvenation
Khyle Eastin, National Bureau of Asian Research, May 10, 2024
One Belt, One Road Strategy
76. China’s Belt and Road Faces European Retreat Over Debt and Dependency Fears
Times of India, May 8, 2024
77. China and Cambodia to begin annual military exercise to strengthen cooperation, fight terrorism
Sopheng Cheang, Associated Press, May 13, 2024
Opinion Pieces
78. Beware forecasts of doom for Taiwan under Lai
Ryan Hass, Brookings Institution, May 14, 2024
79. Vietnam’s Catch-22 in courting China as a rare earth partner
Mengshi Ren, South China Morning Post, May 15, 2024
80. US China Tech Controls Face Problematic Diagnosis
Matthew Eitel, CEPA, May 13, 2024
Recent reports highlight the negative impacts of US tech export controls targeting China. But the US is determined to march forward — and to force allies to follow.
Although US export controls are designed to widen Washington’s lead over Beijing in the race for advanced semiconductors, two new studies suggest the crackdown is boomeranging, hurting US business while helping Chinese companies.
Analysis from the New York Federal Reserve shows the new controls wiped “out $130 billion in market capitalization” for US firms and caused them to “experience a drop in bank lending, profitability, and employment.” Another study from US and Chinese financial experts claims controls on dual-use tech from 2007-2019 caused Chinese tech manufacturing or assembly firms to produce “more high-quality innovations.”
In short: US pressure appears to be accelerating Chinese innovation while depriving US firms of the revenue needed to keep their lead. Despite this evidence, the Biden Administration defends the chip crackdown and vows to continue expanding the export controls.
These studies are among the first to outline the costs of China-focused export controls imposed by the Trump and Biden administrations. President Joseph Biden expanded Trump-era efforts to hamper Chinese telecommunications champion Huawei in October 2022 imposing new export controls on advanced AI chips and chip-making tech.
The US continues to tighten those restrictions. On May 7, the US Department of Commerce revoked licenses for Intel and Qualcomm to sell chips to Huawei. In April, the US forced Dutch chip equipment giant ASML to stop servicing tools made with US tech sold to Chinese customers. The Commerce Department is reportedly considering new controls on selling the software that powers AI services such as ChatGPT. A proposed bipartisan House bill would provide the Department of Commerce with new powers to block exports of advanced AI systems.
The new independent studies portray past US export controls as provoking a wide range of unintended consequences. China “boosted domestic innovation and self-reliance, and increased purchases from non-US firms that produce similar technology.” Beijing points to new Huawei phones powered by Chinese-made advanced chips as early evidence of China out-innovating the US controls.
81. The White House’s Green Trade War Is Just Getting Started
Liam Denning, Bloomberg, May 14, 2024
82. India can be a real alternative to China in pharmaceuticals
Gopal Nadadur and Sam Ide, Nikkei Asia, May 14, 2024
83. Sino-US youth exchanges are vital – and Hong Kong has a role to play
Brian Y. S. Wong, South China Morning Post, May 15, 2024
84. Who will inherit Europe? Xi’s visit makes this an open question
Gabriel Elefteriu, Brussels Signal, May 10, 2024
For all the pomp and ceremony attending the French leg of Xi Jinping’s European tour, it is the stops in Budapest and Belgrade that carry the greater geopolitical significance for the future.
Predictably, the majority of Euro-elite commentary around the Red Emperor’s coming has focused on EU-China trade relations, particularly as regards the EV situation.
For the past week, we have been treated to reflections on the presumed Macron-von der Leyen “good cop-bad cop” tactics, allegedly for gaining some advantage over the Chinese. And Macron — whose behaviour and statements on Ukraine in recent weeks have cemented his profile as a one-person geopolitical calamity to rival Merkel — has been feted, in some quarters, as a great statesman striding the world stage.
But Xi chose France as his main destination for a power voyage for the same reason that Putin did in 2017 (still fresh from imposing the Minsk accords at gunpoint): an immensely gullible Macron playing “Jupiter” in Paris, ready to roll out the red carpet to autocrats in the name of “statecraft.”
There is not much more that Macron’s France can offer at this point except a useful, unwitting cover for the far bigger manoeuvres that the revisionist geopolitical sharks of our days are enacting at “Europe’s” expense. This time it was no different: the real action was not in the “values”-suffused diplomatic environment of Paris, but in the harder-edged nationalist capitals in Europe’s east.
Don’t be fooled by Xi’s talk of “cooperation” and “co-existence”, whether with Europe or the US. It doesn’t mean what we think it does according to our understanding of these terms.
China’s multi-millenarian history does not admit of any notion of co-equality in the Western sense: as Kissinger and others observed long ago, Imperial China (which is what any Chinese state tends towards) can only be at the apex of the world hierarchy. It can only have tributary relationships with other countries, whereby they pay tribute to the Middle Kingdom.
There may be periods of chaos, even degeneration — such as what the Chinese call the “century of humiliation” at the hands of Western colonial policy in the 19th and 20th centuries — but the end goal, the only “correct,” legitimate and thus acceptable arrangement of world affairs, in Chinese eyes, is unquestioned Chinese hegemony.
This is why everything that China does in geopolitical terms, even more than Russia, which ultimately is heir to the European, not Asian, imperial tradition, must be understood through the prism of this final aim and comprehensive notion of absolute primacy.
85. A Plan to Revitalize the Arsenal of Democracy
Michael Brown, War on the Rocks, May 10, 2024
86. Why Is the US Helping China Undermine Global Innovation?
Mark Cohen, International Business Times, May 14, 2024
COMMENT - I’ve relied on Mark’s judgement about issues like this for years, his OpEd here is worth reading. I hope the Biden Administration is paying attention.
87. China is burning all its bridges with Israel
Derek Grossman, Nikkei Asia, May 16, 2024
Desire to be seen as champion of Global South drives policy tilt.
88. America is pulling up the drawbridge
Edward Luce, Financial Times, May 15, 2024
89. Preparing for the Second China Shock
Paul Krugman, New York Times, May 14, 2024
90. Chinese aircraft carrier's voyage hints at plan for 'post-U.S.' navy
Sam Roggeveen, Nikkei Asia, May 17, 2024
'Fujian' may be intended more for bullying than for warfare.
91. The End of TikTok Is a Win for Beijing
Nick Frisch and Dan Wang, New York Times, May 14, 2024
When President Biden signed a bill requiring that TikTok be divested from its Chinese owner, ByteDance, members of Congress hailed the law as a blow to Beijing. They shouldn’t be so quick to celebrate. The law would at best partially mitigate the hazards of misinformation or the risks to national security posed by China. The Communist Party, meanwhile, looks forward to a propaganda windfall, prizing off Washington’s mantle as champion of a free and open internet.
America’s moral authority on maintaining open internet platforms will look very different if it bans TikTok. After years of enduring American sermonizing about free speech and open trade, autocrats would now be able to cite Washington’s own example when they interfere with speech platforms that displease them.
Sponsors of the law say its purpose — prohibiting access to TikTok if it’s not sold to an American entity — is to sever the short-video app’s links to China’s Communist Party. The reality is that the American government will likely end up banning TikTok, turning it off for 170 million American users. Last week, TikTok filed suit to challenge the law. It is not only that nine months is a tight timeline for a corporate sale of this complexity; it’s also that antitrust review alone often takes as long. A tech company like Meta or Google is unlikely to surmount the government’s concerns of acquiring a leading competitor, and there’s no guarantee that a private equity or investor group will be able to pull off this politically fraught deal.
More decisive for TikTok’s destiny in the United States is the will of the Communist Party. In 2020, China’s Ministry of Commerce revised its technology export rules to assert control over the export of specialized algorithms. It has left little doubt that the legal change gives the state discretion to reject the sale of TikTok’s algorithm to any foreign entity. Signaling so in its typically oblique way, state media featured the comments of a professor saying exactly that. Whatever the wishes of ByteDance executives or its investors, any sale of TikTok will require Beijing’s blessing.
None is forthcoming. Since 2020 and again in recent months, official Chinese voices have railed against a potential divestment. Government spokesmen have denounced the deal’s “robber’s logic.” China’s leaders gain little from permitting a sale. The party is not especially concerned for the interests of ByteDance’s financial investors (who are mostly global institutional investors), nor does Beijing seem to mind an opportunity to jerk the leash of ByteDance, whose founder once issued a groveling apology for failing to uphold “socialist core values.”
COMMENT – I disagree with these authors; this is only a propaganda victory for Beijing if one ignores the massive hypocrisy of the PRC’s objections.
Americans will find another App if ByteDance (the CCP refuses to sell) and there will be very little sympathy for investors like Jeff Yass.
92. China and the U.S. Are Numb to the Real Risk of War
Sulmaan Wasif Khan, Foreign Policy, May 12, 2024