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Turning the Tables: China’s Approach to COVID-19

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by Francesca Ghiretti & Lorenzo Mariani

China’s Xi Jinping gets tested during a rare appearance amid the Coronavirus outbreak (Image credit: BBC)

It seems plausible to argue that COVID-19 will accompany us for most of 2020. Given the little information we have about the new coronavirus, the scientific community is cautious in forecasting the duration and extent of the coronavirus epidemic that is raging across the world at present. Although over a hundred countries already recorded cases of contagion, many still focus on China. Interestingly enough, the country has changed from being the centre of the epidemic into the first success story in the fight against the virus, now offering support to the other affected countries. Recently, as a sign of victory against the epidemic and with the aim of reviving the hearts of Chinese citizens, Xi Jinping visited the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the place of origin of COVID-19. In the meantime, commentators continue to wonder what the impact of the virus and of the consequent extraordinary measures taken to counter the virus outbreak will have on China’s governance.

As mentioned in numerous other analyses, the economic impact of the epidemic is of particular concern to international observers. Weakened by the trade war with the United States and by a moderate but steady decline in its growth, the Chinese economy has already begun to feel the effects of the government’s quarantine measures imposed on its citizens and businesses. If already at the end of 2019 the six per cent growth forecast for 2020 seemed excessive, now it seems impossible.

Furthermore, given the importance of Chinese production in global value chains, the world economy will also be affected by the closure of the factories and the Chinese economy’s slowdown. The apparent improvement of the situation in China has now prompted Beijing to loosen quarantine measures and reopen some plants with the aim of restarting the economy. Despite the government’s exhortation to return to their jobs, many Chinese workers remain reticent about the idea of ​​resuming normal work routine as well as public life, to which must be added the fact that some key production areas, such as the province of Hubei, still remain in lockdown.

The fallout of the epidemic on Chinese society is also important. Of major concern is what Beijing will decide to do in the future with the control measures introduced in the midst of the Coronavirus emergency. Over the past few months, in fact, the central government has found in the new technological solutions developed by the main companies in the country a valid ally in the fight against the virus: from the cameras that in addition to detecting the body temperature carry out facial recognition even with masks, to the applications that monitor the potential contact of people with infected citizens. In the eyes of several international observers, the extensive collection of data that today has helped China to contain the epidemic could tomorrow be used to further limit the privacy of Chinese citizens.

On a political level, the central government is unlikely to be affected by drastic repercussions despite the many speculations of the past few weeks which spoke of a possible stability crisis of the Chinese Communist Party and of the Presidency of Xi Jinping due to COVID-19. Although it is true that many, especially in the most affected areas, have criticised the work of the government and the lack of transparency of information, judging from the online response of Chinese users, most of them genuinely adhere to the line presented by the state media. After all, in China the opacity and the distortion of the news are certainly not new, and it should be noted that the majority of citizens who have not been directly affected by the health crisis have not developed a sense of dissatisfaction with the party such as to lead to political claims of the aforesaid scope.

The containment of criticism in the domestic environment was obviously facilitated by the Party’s communication machine, which was set in motion at full capacity already in the first days of the health crisis and which is now helping the government to recover internal consensus and international support. Much of the initial energy was spent primarily to prevent any blame and negligence from falling on the central government. To pay the costs, as it very often happens in China, was, therefore, the local government of the province of Hubei, guilty of not having contained and managed the infection. In a second phase, the communication of the Chinese press organs concentrated its efforts in promoting a national cohesion campaign under the leadership of the Party which culminated in Xi Jinping’s visit to Wuhan where the President met the population and, albeit via connection. remote, even the sick.

Finally, over the past few days, the main attention of the Chinese media has focused on the rest of the world and especially on the United States, accused of having chosen to adopt a “selfish” attitude during a time of global crisis. Proposing itself once again in antithesis to the US policies of closures, China is now seeking to recover the ground that it lost over the past few months. An attempt to revive its image as a responsible nation, ready to collaborate multilaterally for the good of the international community and to send out support to its partners in case of need. In this regard, emblematic is the case of the alleged preferential treatment reserved to Italy in the reception of medical supplies from China, often described as the result of the special relationship that exists between the two countries.

It is still too early to know for sure what the consequences of this health crisis will be on China’s internal politics and international ambitions. What seems clear is that Xi appears to have endured one of the most demanding tests since he took power in 2012. Furthermore, it clearly surfaces the idea that if in the coming months Beijing will be able to play its cards well, then China, and with it the Chinese Communist Party, could even emerge from this crisis stronger than before.

This article was originally published by the Rome-based Istituto Affari Internazionali

Francesca Ghiretti is a PhD candidate at King’s College London where she has been awarded the Leverhulme Scholarship as part of the project ‘Interrogating Visions of a Post-Western World: Interdisciplinary and Interregional Perspectives on the Future in a Changing International Order’. Her thesis is about Chinese FDI in the EU. Francesca is also a Research Fellow in the Asia department at Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) in Rome and a geopolitical consultant at CQS, a London-based hedge fund.

Lorenzo Mariani is Research Fellow in the field of Asian studies at the Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) in Rome where he collaborates mainly on research projects dealing with Chinese domestic and foreign affairs, and Inter-Korean relations. Since 2017, he has been Korea Foundation Fellow. He graduated in International Relations at the University of Bologna and earned a Master’s double degree in China Studies from Zhejiang University and University of Turin. During his academic career, he was an exchange student at Peking University (Beijing) and at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies (Seoul).

China, Myanmar, War Crimes and the Issue of “National Sovereignty”

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by Anna Tan

 

A banner reads “Myanmar warmly welcomes the Chinese President Xi Jinping” (Image credit: AP/Aung Shine Oo)

In September 2017, ten Rohingya Muslims were executed by the Burmese military in the village of Inn Din, Rakhine State, Myanmar (Burma). Afterward, journalists leading the Reuters investigation that exposed the massacre were charged with treason under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act. Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and once an icon of peace, fiercely defended the government’s incarceration of the two journalists arguing that their detention had “nothing to do with freedom of expression at all” and was all about the “violation of the Official Secrets Act”. The Reuters journalists were later released in 2019 through an annual presidential clemency after a year of unyielding international pressure and legal support led by Amal Clooney.

The whole debacle formed part of the 2016 persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar’s Rakhine State, which entailed a violent crackdown of the Muslim minority that has settled in the land for generations. The Rohingyas were subject to the arson of their villages, gang rapes, and infanticide, which the UN has called a “textbook ethnic cleansing”. In the end, over 20,000 Rohingyas died and over 700,000 fled their homes, crossing the border to Bangladesh and residing in refugee camps ever since. Suu Kyi dismissed the genocide claims at the ICJ hearings filed by The Gambia and instead defended the “clearance operations” including the Inn Din massacre as part of a “counter-terrorism” response by the military, yet completely omitting a plethora of remaining war crimes committed by those same armed forces.

On 16 November 2019, the New York Times published the Xinjiang Papers, which explicitly showed in over 400 leaked pages a breakdown of how the Chinese government organised the crackdown on Uyghur Muslims – a Turkic ethnic minority – into “re-education camps.” These facilities, better described as concentration camps, see one to three million Uyghurs detained extrajudicially in Xinjiang each year. Later evidence also corroborated this puzzle. The BBC’s recent insider report on such “thought transformation camps” renders an eerie atmosphere as one cannot help but concur such camps are run with no motive other than ethnic-cleansing and Sinification.

Xi Jinping has repeatedly described the Uyghur Muslims as “being infected by a virus” that needs to be “eradicated,” following multiple terrorist attacks in the region, in the form of riots, bombings, and knife attacks. For Beijing, “stability” is key since Xinjiang serves as the gateway for China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects with Central Asia and Pakistan. However, Beijing’s approach to achieving stability is in many ways one that could instead undermine the state’s very authority and legitimacy, because of its oppressive policies pursued outside of the rule of law. Here, memories of the Tiananmen Massacre still remain fresh.

Meanwhile, in Myanmar, Suu Kyi’s refusal to call out the war crimes against civilians continued, with prospects for an end to the 70-year long Burmese Civil War seeming increasingly frail. Once a major Western ally, Suu Kyi’s shining moment after the landslide 2015 elections proved to be short-lived, leaving Myanmar dependent on China. Despite on-going local protests stirred by environmental and land-right concerns against China’s BRI projects in Rakhine, Suu Kyi has increasingly grown friendly with the Communist Party-led country which over the past two decades has consistently vetoed UN Security Council resolutions regarding human rights violations in Myanmar, actions perpetrated by the same actors that worked with the military in prolonging Suu Kyi’s house arrest. Once a fierce critic of China and of imbalanced investments, the foundations of Suu Kyi’s foreign policy have been upended. Instead, China is now employed as a bulwark against international criticism on Myanmar’s human rights fiasco.

Wang Yi and Suu Kyi in 2016 (Image Credit: Reuters)

Her meeting with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi ahead of the ICJ hearings sent clear signals to the world that both countries are now united against the international community in Myanmar’s domestic political issues, with Suu Kyi thanking China for “safeguarding national sovereignty” and “opposing foreign interference.” China’s intermediation role with armed groups over the last couple of years has increased despite two failed attempts by China to repatriate the Rohingya, actions that are widely seen as having exacerbated the situation.

It is difficult to decipher the exact Sino-Burmese strategies in “resolving” the Rohingya crisis, but it remains crystal clear that both parties are suggesting that the West is an outsider in this rather peculiar yet unsurprising entente. China, usually staunch about following its “non-interference” principle to its foreign policies in contemporary political discourse, we see there can be exceptional cases. Earlier, during the Libyan Civil War in 2011, Beijing found its involvement essential, with over 30,000 Chinese nationals in Libya needing to be evacuated. Myanmar, on the other hand, provides China with a gateway to the Indian Ocean; thereby circumventing the South China Sea, a much-disputed area of maritime security and defence.

Once on antagonistic terms, the distinction between China’s communist leaders, Suu Kyi’s government and the military of Myanmar now seem to be increasingly challenging one to make, with their exclusionary narratives running parallel. Is China, an authoritarian country, truly an ideal friend to help Myanmar towards becoming a democracy, let alone a liberal one? Suu Kyi’s remarks thanking China for “safeguarding [Myanmar]’s national sovereignty” with regards to foreign influence is farcical. In addition, with the landmark visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Myanmar – which saw the signing of 33 memorandums of understandings (MoUs), protocols and agreements including bilateral partnerships on issues regarding border patrol, police, information and media services – there is little doubt as to the hegemonic aspirations of China.

Indeed, China’s moves with regards to a cash-strapped economy like Myanmar is another step in its debt-trap diplomacy. This development is reminiscent of the case of the Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka – where the conflict-ridden country, unable to save its fledgling export rates and attract sufficient Foreign Direct Investments (FDI), found itself forced to sign a 99-year lease of the port to China to cover its colossal amount of current account deficit. Sri Lanka’s case should give Myanmar a premonition about what is still yet to come.

Xi Jinping and Aung San Suu Kyi shaking hands, during a visit aimed at cementing the ties between China and Myanmar (Image Credit: SCMP)

The ICJ’s verdict arrived shortly after Xi’s visit to Myanmar, on the 23 January. The UN court ruled against Myanmar with a unanimous approval of provisional measures as requested by The Gambia on the war crimes against the Rohingya. This ruling may well be a disappointment for many Burmese loyalists that rallied across the country in support of Suu Kyi’s ICJ defence earlier in December last year, as well as a cause for disillusionment amongst the country’s believers who were confident that the ICJ case is firmly secure in the hands of Suu Kyi’s political eloquence, despite the insurmountable evidence pointing in the other direction.

Though long overdue, perhaps the ruling will provide a stronger reason for the Burmese to question their status quo politics and politicians. However, the answers should be obvious as to whether Myanmar, currently caught in an asymmetric relationship with China, truly has its national sovereignty “safeguarded;” whether or not if Myanmar is walking in the right direction towards liberal democracy; and indeed whether a brighter or darker future awaits the country.

Anna is an MSc student for Global Affairs at King’s College London. She has previously worked for UNDP and the American Red Cross. Her research interests are on ASEAN-North Asian relations, conflict-resolution, human rights and diplomacy. She is also currently a Programme Coordinator for the Conflict, Security and Development (CSD) Conference 2020 hosted by Department of War Studies and Department of International Development (DID). You can follow her on Twitter: @AnnaTanGTW

China’s Turbulent Year: 2019

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by Kerry Brown

Chinese President Xi Jinping faces a turbulent 2020 (Photo Credit: AFP)

2019 was not an easy year for Xi Jinping’s China. The most obvious cause of this was the ongoing tensions with the US, mostly taking the form of trade frictions. While these dissipated to some degree by the year’s end, it was the happenings in Hong Kong and Xinjiang that will probably prove most significant. These are likely to have a long term impact on the trajectory of the People’s Republic, with Xinjiang in particular offering a more profound and worrying set of problems.

For Hong Kong, the perpetual protests from the middle of the year were the issue that attracted most international attention. The city is held in deep affection by anyone who is associated with it, or even knows about it. To see it’s people often divided, with the government some days almost under siege, with acts of violence by police and protesters on the streets, sometimes almost daily, was truly a tragedy. A unique, hybrid place looked, towards the year-end, to be in perpetual decline.

It is easy to seek to defend one of the sides involved in the Hong Kong issue over others. But the fault lies with almost every party. The Chief Executive, Carrie Lam, has been lamentable. Her greatest failure in the long term will probably be the way in which she has illustrated with a stark finality none of her three predecessors ever did the lack of power in her hands and the need to constantly be seeking support from Beijing. From her handling of the original proposal to introduce extradition legislation which was seen as violating the city’s hard-won legal autonomy, to her response to the subsequent demands of the protesters, there is little about her performance that inspires confidence. She remains in power however because she has managed to maintain the support, however, of the one group that matters to her – the leadership in Beijing.

On their part, the Xi leadership has refrained, so far, from direct intervention in the security of Hong Kong, no matter that it might or might not be doing behind the scenes. But its shrill defensive attitude to the plight of the city, and the ways in which it has indicated little real desire to compromise only expose the ways in which it clearly regards the One Country, Two Systems rubric as little more than window dressing. For it, the most worrying aspect of the city’s 2019 travails should be the ways in which they showed the real problems of a Chinese model of governance in a place which is incontestably of Chinese identity, and part of the PRC sovereign territory. The impact of that on views in Taiwan, where many look on in dismay at Hong Kong and fee their rejection of the ways in which it is offered as a model they may one day which to reunify with the Mainland, has been dramatic, and will probably have long term consequences. There is little overt sign at the moment at least that this is the lesson Beijing has drawn from 2019 and Hong Kong – but it should be.

But nor can the protesters be spared criticism. Lionised by many in the west, including the US Congress, some members of whom have sought to reap political capital from the city’s challenges, protesters have proved a diverse, and sometimes disunited and fractious group. While many have shown courage, and the success of more pro-independence parties in the 2019 local elections was a huge moral victory, they still lack coherent political leadership. It is an easy thing to be critical about this, and a hugely hard thing to achieve – but in the end, unless there can be unifying, and pragmatic voices from the protesting groups managing to steer their grievances in a more constructive, political direction, rather than stoking constant protest, it is hard to see how they can create long term benefit for themselves out of the shocks of the last few months.

Hong Kong, however, does have some things worth fighting for – from its legal system, which at least still has some integrity, to the vestiges of freedom of expression which, for all the complaints, are still there, albeit eroded. Xinjiang was, until quite late in 2019, a less exposed issue. But it is likely that this will be the one with potentially the deepest long term consequences. The implementation of harsh security measures there since 2018 have involved, reportedly, up to a million people. Papers obtained by the New York Times in November 2019 showed the extent of the commitment to the clampdown on Uighur’s, along with some evidence of opposition to it by officials locally which had been snuffed out.

Chen Qiangguo, Party Secretary of the autonomous region, and previously the top official in Tibet, has received unwelcome international attention as the protests have increased across the world, from Turkey to Europe to the US, about what has been occurring in the area. Under the guise of security and counter-terrorism, the detention of so many has resulted in some gut-wrenching testimony of families destroyed, and ordinary people swept up in a series of events that clearly have left them incarcerated, evidently judged guilty without even the vaguest pretence of an attempt to follow any kind of due process.

Xinjiang is an issue over which the central government seems unwilling to brook any compromise. Attempts to discuss the issue even in the most placatory way are usually met with defensiveness in China. This is our domestic issue, the line goes, and one that involves serious issues of security concerns. Foreigner’s comments and criticisms are unwelcome.

Despite this, Xinjiang is potentially a long term, deep worry for the Chinese government for a number of reasons. Through the imposition of draconian policies, some, according to the evidence offered by the New York Times leaked documents, imposed with little consideration of the risk of unwanted outcomes, there is a high possibility that a generation of Uighurs ostensibly being re-educated in the camps in the region is actually being radicalised. The official measures here are almost designed to breed deep resentment and anger, something which may take years or decades to manifest itself, but which should not be taken lightly. The very outcome that all the effort the government has expended in Xinjiang over the last few years – greater security – may well be the one put most at risk by the way it has sought to achieve this.

This is a strange position for the Chinese government to be in. Usually so cautious about what it does, and deliberative, it seems that in Xinjiang it has acted according to an almost knee jerk way, bringing in a suite of actions and regulations that show little sign of having been pondered a bit more thoroughly and questioned.

One of these side effects can already be seen – the detrimental effect that Xinjiang has had on international opinion towards Xi’s PRC. Already, a formidable array of critical voices have started to be raised. At a time when the country’s global role is already becoming more prominent, and its potential critics and enemies are seeking for something to rally around, this issue above all has unfortunately given them plenty of highly legitimate material to cast back at the Chinese government.

With some signs at the end of 2019 that the policies in Xinjiang might be softening, 2020 may well see the intense anger at this issue at least decrease. The government may, after all, have been listening, and seek to silently repair some of the damage done. But the odds must very unfortunately be on them harvesting a long term and a serious set of challenges from the 2018-2019 Xinjiang clampdown. What is currently a tragedy for many people in Xinjiang may well end up being one for the whole country, proving one of the most bitter lessons from Chinese history: that its greatest threats come more often from the inner Asian region than its coastal areas.

Kerry Brown is Professor of Chinese Studies and Director of the Lau China Institute at King’s College, London. He is an Associate of the Asia Pacific Programme at Chatham House, London, an adjunct of the Australia New Zealand School of Government in Melbourne, and the co-editor of the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, run from the German Institute for Global Affairs in Hamburg.

A Matter of Survival: How the Trade War will Shape China’s Future

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By Francesca Ghiretti and Lloyd Yijue Liu

2 May 2019

The trade war between the US and China is just the tip of the iceberg of deeper differences that will have complex ramifications (Manufacturing.net)

 

The trade war between the US and China is more than what meets the eye, and this is not a mystery. In fact, besides the trade deficit, there are multiple aspects at stake: intellectual property rights, the opening of the Chinese market and most of all, the political-economic system of China. The economic aspects appear to be laden with heavy political values for both actors. For Trump the trade war is a political means aimed at reinvigorating his political message with the eye on re-election, while for Xi Jinping it is a matter of survival, both his and that of the Communist Party of China (CPC).

Although negotiations are ongoing, the deeper political issues on the table risk triggering a mutation of the trade war. During the current state of affairs, an open armed conflict is highly unlikely. However, it is probable that the conflict between China and the US may spread to other countries and areas of interest, thus creating a complex matrix of entangled elements. The fight for technological advancement appears to be the most notorious battlefield, leading many to believe that in the near future the trade war could take on the shape of a technology war. The case of Huawei and the debate on AI are only two early examples of what such a conflict might look like. One wonders: why technology? Technological advancement is fundamental for the survival of the American primacy in the world and of the CPC in China. Both powers are aware that those who will lead the technological revolution that is unfolding under our eyes will lead the world in the coming years. After all, Britain would have hardly had the capacity to build an empire without the advantage of the first industrial revolution, and the West would have looked very differently and occuped a very different global position were it not for the industrial (and technological) revolutions.

Thus, both China and the US interpret the ongoing power struggle as a matter of survival, and technological development appears to be the main arena in which the battle is fought. In the long-run, instances for the US and China to face each other and present their contrasting models will not be lacking in number. However, in the short term, an agreement might be reached. It is for this reason that we propose three different scenarios each consisting of a possible outcome of the current negotiations between the two countries. In scenario one, an agreement is reached, and all tariffs are dropped. Scenario two describes the current situation– a state of limbo where some tariffs are in place but there is still space for communication and for a sudden turn in any direction. In the third scenario the US and China are unable to get a significant deal, leading to the prolonging and worsening of hostilities.

There is a perceivable division between the motives of President Donald Trump and those of the American strategists. The former needs a victory in view of the upcoming elections, even more so following the failure of the negotiations with North Korea. American strategists, on the other hand, appear to be seeking a more radical change in China’s way of doing business. Trump’s goal is to obtain an agreement which has the aspect of a victory for the US, with China expected to open its market to more American investments and firms, protect intellectual property and balance the trade deficit. Such objective seeks only a superficial change which would mean sizeable but not system-changing concessions by China.

The adoption of a Foreign Investment Law by China and the reform of the law on Intellectual Property suggests China’s propension to implement a few changes in order to find an agreement with the US, at least formally. On the other hand, the broader aims of the strategists seek deeper changes which ultimately would strip the CPC of its absolute centrality. This might be a real deal-breaker, should they be seriously pursued. In fact, Xi understands the importance of achieving an agreement for the sake of the Chinese economy. However, the survival of the CPC and its control over the entire Chinese society will always remain the first priority. All in all, what is to be expected is a temporary deal where China makes some quantitatively significant concessions but leaves structural changes to an unknown future.

Scenario 1. Trade deal (Tariffs at 0%)

In the first scenario the trade war ends with the US and China reaching an agreement which leads to the abolition of all the tariffs. However, this scenario envisages not a peace treaty but a regulated and extended truce. The deeper issue however, the nature of the Chinse political system, will not have been resolved. The basis of the Chinese government’s actions lays firmly with the doctrine of the ‘party leads everything’ (党是领导一切的) and is expected to remain. Here, the CPC would keep on centrally managing all aspects of China’s life, including areas which in the West are usually private or independent, such as academia and the judiciary. If the US is seeking a change in such approach, this issue is destined to come to the surface again at some point in the future and spur a conflict between the two.

In the short run, however, China will certainly be more collaborative with the US and the West. This would not mean a return to Deng Xiaoping’s ‘hide and bide’ paradigm, but a purely rhetorical switch to a more low-key and friendly campaign to present the ‘rise of China’ to the world, while creating more skillful ways of attracting foreign talent and importing technology and know-how from developed countries to develop China itself. Moreover, forging new strategic partnerships in the Western sphere would be easier with the blessing of the US and China’s renewed collaborative attitude.

Scenario 2. Further extending the deadline for a deal (Tariffs at 10%)

Currently, we are likely to be living the last moments of this transition scenario, which is probably advantaging China more than the US. The longer the negotiation lasts, the more uncertainty to the global economy and pressure on Trump’s credentials it will bring. The CPC is not immune to the political repercussions of a slowing economy, but unlike Trump, Xi does not have to face elections in a few months. Were it not for these looming elections, Trump too would have highly benefitted from a longer period for negotiations, as it would have allowed him to test whether China’s promises turned into reality. In such a scenario, a full-fledged deal (Scenario 1) would still be on the table, but China would have time to consider and perhaps test other alternatives. To force the Americans to reach a suboptimal deal and to protect their own economy from future repercussions, the Chinese might try to intensify their transactions with other trading partners. They might also try to explore possible fractures between the US and its allies, such as the EU, while exploiting the disruption of the global supply chain of goods manufactured in the country, such as tech components, to increase the pressure on the reaching of a deal and preparing for more negative alternative scenarios.

Scenario 3. No deal (Tariffs at 25%)

This is not the most likely outcome. However, with Trump and Xi, two stubborn leaders leading the discussions, this option cannot be ruled out. In this case, China and the US would become more assertive in implementing their own plans and fulfilling their geopolitical interests. Thus, multiple actors and areas of interests, such as technology, geopolitical claims and multilateral settings, would be involved in the disputes which is likely to take place simultaneously in different arenas, an example of which was the run for technological advancement previously mentioned. If the conflict becomes further politicised; China will make it difficult for the US to reach its goals in any international issues which China has influence on (such as in North Korea, the South China Sea or instances presented to the UN Security Council). At the same time, China would actively strengthen its already existing alliances, seek new allies and leverage any possible dispute between the US and its allies.

At home, the CPC would further devalue the Renminbi (RMB) to maintain China’s competitive edge while promoting stronger nationalism. In fact, it is believed that after 1979, the way in which the CPC maintained the level of legitimacy it needed to govern has slowly shifted from a nationalistic rhetoric to a more pragmatic promise of future wealth for Chinese people. Now that growth is slowing, and the West is becoming more hostile to China’s economic power, the CPC is attempting to transform the public’s economic grievances into a nationalistic feeling of an imminent external threats, which would grant the Party more space of maneuver. Interestingly, although often thought otherwise, it has been shown that the younger generations are at the same time materialistic and nationalistic, the use of an emergency rhetoric might override their materialistic need and help them endure economic difficulty in time of perceived external threats.

Regardless of the outcome of the trade war, the Chinese government could use its tax policy and the control of property price to encourage consumer spending. Furthermore, the CPC is likely to implement more large-scale infrastructure construction projects to keep the economy running in an attempt to mitigate the impact of the trade war and the slowing economy. An excellent example of this is the outcome of the recent Belt and Road Forum where China has strongly reaffirmed its commitment to the realisation of the project, robustly responding to the increasing skepticism towards the feasibility of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). In China, more openness of the market has oftne been followed by a tightening effort for societal control to avoid a Soviet-style system collapse, this is likely to remain the case in the foreseeable future. Abroad, as in Scenario 2, China would seek new allies. However, according to the outcome of the trade war, the degree of assertiveness used by China to pursue such goal will change.

In conclusion, none of the scenarios presented rules out a future clash between the US and China, as the power struggle between the two will endure even after reaching a potential agreement. Their embodiment of different, and in certain aspects antithetical, models of governance and development will impede the complete appeasement between the two, leaving the world politics and economy in an uncertain state of affairs. In the long-run, this is likely to end with a drastic change in one of the two actors and the subsequent victory of one and loss of the other.

Francesca Ghiretti is a doctoral candidate at department of War Studies and European and International Relations at King’s College London where she has been awarded the Leverhulme scholarship ‘Interrogating Visions of a Post-Western World: Interdisciplinary and Inter regional Perspectives on the Future in a Changing International Order’. The focus of her thesis is the political response of the EU to Chinese foreign direct investments. Follow her @Fraghiretti.

Lloyd Yijue Liu is currently working as a research assistant for the China part of the research project Mapping Elite Networks and Governance in the 21st Century at the Department of Political Science at VU University of Amsterdam. He holds an advanced master’s degree in International Relations and Diplomacy from Leiden University and previously studied History and Modern European Studies at the University of British Columbia.

Strife Series on National Perspectives in North-East Asian Rivalries, Part IV – Pyongyang: The View From Beijing

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By Riccardo Cociani

Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CCP & President of the PRC, and Kim Jong-un, ‘Supreme Leader’ of the DPRK (Credit Image: Getty)

There is nothing easy regarding Beijing’s strategic calculus about North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, DPRK). China’s difficult relationship with the DPRK rests upon balancing its vital interests: first, peace and stability on the Korean peninsula; second, its denuclearization; third, the preservation of its influential relationship with DPRK; fourth, crisis-prevention[1]. In short, China seeks to balance the maintenance of the status-quo, while simultaneously trying to change it. By changing it, China aims to maintain the upper hand. A cost-benefit analysis of the losses and gains resulting from the pursuit of each of its interests mentioned above would require China to adopt a more assertive military stance.

Of critical importance to any strategic calculations is context: not just the territory involved, in this case the Korean Peninsula, but also the global strategic landscape. Any Chinese military strategy involving the DPRK must also take into account China’s other priorities. How should China balance its security stance vis-à-vishe DPRK while simultaneously trying to provide a stable global landscape to allow its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to grow? How to balance foreign and domestic security concerns? What is the best strategy to allow China to reach its ‘New Normal’? This article will first highlight the major factors influencing China’s perceptions of the DPRK threat; and second, it will contend that China is adopting a more assertive military stance. Ultimately, this paper will argue that the likelihood of a Chinese military intervention on the Korean peninsula has now increased, and moreover, that Beijing would benefit from a tougher military stance.

 

Security ‘with Chinese Characteristics’

China’s East Asian insecurity rhetoric blames United States (US) troops, bases, and regional allies for surrounding China with a ‘containment by alliance’ coupled with efforts to undermine China from within[2]. Of greater importance for China is the proliferation of nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula. Conventional scholarly wisdom held that, should the DPRK acquire nuclear weapons, other states like Japan, South Korea and even Taiwan also would have pursued their own nuclear program. This has not been the case and it remains unlikely. China’s concern of a ‘nuclear containment’, therefore, only rests in theory. There is also the risk of proliferation of nuclear material and weapons to non-state actors, such as terrorist groups. Xi Jinping cannot afford this; the BRI must remain unthreatened and its economy must grow according to its ‘New Normal’[3]. This complicates China’s pursuit of its interests and begs the question: will China intervene? The increasing securitisation of the Sino-DPRK border[4] [5], the opening of China’s first overseas base in Djibouti[6], and the most recent report of a military base in Afghanistan[7] indicate an increasingly assertive China, raising the perspective of Chinese interventionism[8]. While it is noted that China has historically breached its policy numerous times[9], the DPRK may bring the official birth of Chinese interventionism. By no means will this situation create a stable Korean peninsula and increased pressure from the international community will test China’s non-interference sustainability[10].

For China to reach some of its most important vital interests, it may have to reconsider its relationship and alliance with Pyongyang. At the same time, the Sino-DPRK alliance comes with its own benefits, too: a buffer zone. This provides Beijing with faster access to North-Korea, thereby allowing China to reach and secure the DPRK’s nuclear reactors and weapons before the US and its allies could. Furthermore, this middle-ground impedes the American military from reaching China’s border. It also allows China to project its political, economic and diplomatic outreach to the North. Of critical importance to the DPRK are Chinese energy exports. This buffer zone therefore presents a Chinese political extension covered by Beijing’s economic and diplomatic power, with the possibility of military action.

 

China, the US, and the DPRK: The Future of the Korean Peninsula

Only time can tell what Beijing’s next significant move will be. China’s strategic calculus, more than ever, must also find a balance with ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ (XiJinping xindai zhongguotese shehui zhuyi sixiang). China’s pursuit of the status quo[11] appears to be trickling down to its end. For the time being, it appears that China is biding time to create enough room for political, diplomatic, and strategic manoeuvre to rebalance the strategic calculus on the Korean peninsula. This does not signify a particularly decisive shift when historically compared. Nevertheless, the stakes appear higher than ever not only for China, but for the US too.

US President Donald Trump’s rhetoric against the DPRK misguided; evoking military action without clear end goals will not solve anything. In fact, Trump’s rhetoric is accompanied by an inappropriate military approach: limited strike against DPRK nuclear facilities will not lead to limited conflict.[12] Only time would be limited, before DPRK and China would intervene militarily. Limited strikes, therefore, may lead to unlimited war. Their post-9/11 military interventions point to this lesson.

Trump’s threats are more likely to upset Beijing, ultimately raising hostility between the US and China, while simultaneously pushing one another further away. Instead, they should seek military rapprochement, which unfortunately appears unlikely for the time being. Furthermore, as Oriana Skylar Mastro points out, the deterioration of Sino-DPRK relations over the past two decades would lead Beijing not to intervene to protect itself, but to “secure its own interests”[13]. In addition, during Xi Jinping’s most recent visits to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), he called for them to be ready to fight, to win any war, and to “neither fear hardships nor death”[14]. The PLA’s current modernization and restructuring further indicates this: by practising joint warfare capabilities, the CCP expects its armed forces to fight and win on its own. Yet, following the current Sino-American strategic mistrust, this would bring the US and China closer to war rather than closer to peaceful cooperation. Therefore, should Trump’s brinkmanship rhetoric cause conflict, the US and the rest of the world should not expect China to come to their help: China’s self-interests will trump American and global worries.

The deployment of the US’s Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to South Korea in 2017 represents just this. China has strongly opposed its deployment[15]. The anti-ballistic missile defence system is currently deployed to counter the DPRK’s ballistic missiles. Although THAAD’s effectiveness [16] in the Korean peninsula is disputed, China feels particularly threatened by its capabilities, most critically its radar performance. THAAD can detect airborne objects over 1000km away, which is well within Chinese airspace. In addition, THAAD could strengthen the US alliance system in East Asia “by virtue of [its] technical characteristics”[17] by allowing American and South Korean radars, and even Japanese ones if it also acquires THAAD, to be connected. Not only would this improve the alliance’s cohesion, but also improve the chances of hitting targets. Lastly, increased detection and response capabilities signify that any Chinese offensive would have very little surprise effect, thereby hindering its chances of military success. To check and balance THAAD, China may expand its nuclear arsenal and target South Korea “should hostilities erupt between China and the US”[18].

 

Conclusion

Today, China would be better positioned to open its ‘lips and teeth’[19] and tell DPRK that it will “show your strength, carpe diem” instead of “hide your strength, bide your time”[20]. Xi cannot afford a conflict over the Korean peninsula. He has already stated that China will not rescue the DPRK if it causes a conflict[21]. The US has shown its willingness to fight directly against North Korea, meaning US boots on the ground and closer to China’s border, with North Korean refugees attempting to cross into China’s mainland. Xi must carefully and simultaneously balance China’s pursuit of stability on the peninsula, the strengthening of China’s national security, and the pursuit of Korean peace. Currently, China appears to be attempting to wedge into the DPRK via diplomatic, political, and economic channels in order to restrain Kim Jong-un[22]; any serious escalation will witness a Chinese military response to protect itself. Time is of the essence.

Riccardo Cociani graduated in BA War Studies from King’s College London in 2017. He was the President of the KCL Crisis Team, and held research and manager positions on projects related to China, Japan, and NATO. He is currently pursuing a Double MSc in International Affairs at Peking University and the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). His research focuses on international security, strategy, East Asian security, and China. You can find him at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/riccardo-cociani-32558587/

Notes:

[1] Yinhong, 2015, p.18

[2] Chung, 2011, p.100

[3] Zhang & Chen, 2017

[4] Channel News Asia, 2018

[5] “Every time China-North Korea relations worsen, there’s always a report of China moving troops around the border.” in Zheng, 2017

[6] Zheng, 2017

[7] Toktomushev, 2018

[8] Neriah, 2017

[9] Brown, 2013

[10] Brown, 2013

[11] Chung, 2011, p.108

[12] Most recent military threats only indicate a tactical reaction to an eventual DPRK provocation. It remains difficult to assert with confidence what the US’s end goals in a war against DPRK would be. This only raises doubts whether the US has an actual military strategy intended to reach those goals.

[13] Skylar Mastro, 2017

[14] Phillips, 2018

[15] The State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, 2017

[16] Cirincione, 2017

[17] DeVore, 2017, p.70

[18] Devore, 2017, p.69

[19] Mao Zedong described the Sino-DPRK relationship to be as close as ‘lips and teeth’

[20] Famously put by Deng Xiaoping, this has shaped Chinese foreign policy and military strategy for the past three decades

[21] Skylar Mastro, 2017

[22] Daekwon, 2017

 

Image Source: Here

 

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