Re: China
Posted: Tue Apr 13, 2021 11:28 am
Part 2
The War On China
JAN 2
WRITTEN BY IZAK NOVAK
3. The Single Largest Threat to U.S. Empire – The Belt and Road Initiative
With the consolidation of the domestic economy and establishment of linkages to the outside world, the PRC now has the task of looking outward and establishing an international base of support. Most importantly, China wants to break the encirclement of U.S. empire that I mentioned above. Only through the breakdown of U.S. hegemony and imperialism can China continue to move forward on its path of socialist construction. The Belt and Road Initiative, first announced by Xi Jinping in 2013, is the leading edge of this effort to establish trade and political linkages throughout Eurasia with Beijing at the center.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is the most significant geoeconomic effort in history, a multi-decade $4-$8 trillion plan impacting 70% of humanity with the goal to develop productive forces throughout Eurasia and steadily erode U.S. power in the hemisphere. The significance of this effort cannot be overstated, as Henry Kissinger warned:
“China’s Belt and Road Initiative, in seeking to connect China to Central Asia and eventually to Europe will have the practical significance of shifting the world’s center of gravity from the Atlantic to the Pacific”26
The more that countries are able to stand on their own two feet economically and have access to their neighbors and China as a trading partner, the less power the U.S. has to impose its political will on countries through economic coercion.
The BRI will link Asia and ultimately Europe through ports, bridges, railways, green energy and trade. It will help historically overexploited countries fill development gaps and reduce or eliminate their reliance on the U.S. and the dollar. Perhaps most importantly, it will significantly reduce the effectiveness of one of U.S. imperialism’s favorite tools – economic sanctions. The more that countries are able to stand on their own two feet economically and have access to their neighbors and China as a trading partner, the less power the U.S. has to impose its political will on countries through economic coercion.
There are many elements to this plan, but essentially it involves both individual infrastructure and investment projects in other countries and the establishment of non-U.S. international institutions. Ironically, the historically negative legacy of U.S.-dominated institutions like the World Bank and IMF combined with U.S. aggression against countries that don’t conform to U.S. hegemony has encouraged even unlikely countries to participate in Chinese projects.
One very significant example of this is the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), an alternative to the World Bank and IMF that is centered on Beijing. Russia was one of the first countries to join as a full member in 2015, during a period in which U.S.-Russia relations were at a very low level and about to sink further following the 2016 election. The AIIB even includes27 many EU countries, Canada and otherwise staunch U.S. allies like India, Saudi Arabia and Australia. China is the largest voting bloc in the bank, followed by India, Russia, Germany, South Korea and Australia. The map of AIIB members is essentially a map of Eurasia, plus many other non-regional members (Green and dark blue are full members):
Figure: AIIB Membership Map from Wikipedia28
China has in recent years moved aggressively to sign deals with countries like Pakistan and Iran on BRI projects and investment. Deals with Iran have been happening for years, totaling tens of billions of dollars in support29 – massive amounts considering the immense economic pressure Iran is under from U.S. sanctions.
The extent to which China and Iran are being linked is visible in the various infrastructure projects taking place. These include:
The New Silk Road freight train route which opened in 2016, linking Tehran to Urumqi in Western China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. The freight route also connects Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Transportation time for goods was reduced from 45-50 days by sea to 14-15 days. This rail line cuts directly through the “triangle of control” over Central and Western Asia where U.S. imperialism is heavily active.
*926 km railroad from Tehran to the eastern city of Mashhad. This electrified railway will be built by a Chinese SOE, China National Machinery Import and Export Corporation. It will cut the transportation time between cities in half and increase capacity.
*415 km high speed rail line between Tehran and Isfahan via Qom, being built by SOE China Railway Engineering Corp.
*263 km railway between Kermanshah and Khosravi, being built by SOE China Railway Construction Corp.
*Railway system connecting Tehran, Hamedan and Sanandaj being built by SOE China National Machinery Industry Corp.
Importantly, the New Silk Road freight train is not going to stop in Tehran. Plans are to have this rail system extend all the way into Europe. For the other projects, Iranians will gain greater economic connectivity between regions. All of this is happening while Iran is facing severe sanctions from the U.S.
Another key element of the BRI in Central Asia has been the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor or CPEC. CPEC is a cornerstone project of the BRI, with the most important element being the development of Gwadar Port in Balochistan Province. This port, made operational in 2016, is a critical element in bringing goods to and from the BRI network, potentially transforming Gwadar into a major regional economic hub. It also diversifies shipping routes from China, which is a key element in upending a potential U.S. blockade. While beyond the scope of this article, the peeling away of Pakistan from the U.S. is a major geopolitical victory for China. Remember that Operation Cyclone – the U.S.-led operation of aiding the Mujahideen against the USSR – was largely funneled through Pakistan’s intelligence agency the ISI.
Perhaps equally disturbing to U.S. empire is the willingness of otherwise close allies to participate in BRI projects. In March of 2019, Italy signed a variety deals with China as part of the BRI. Western media, especially in the U.S, immediately pounced on the news with CNBC declaring it will “only exacerbate tensions between Italy and its neighbors.”30 Reaction was overwhelmingly negative in U.S. media and political spheres in the U.S. and EU.
The U.S. has attempted to discredit the BRI, with commentators arguing that it is placing countries into a “debt trap”. Debt trap claims are not supported by the evidence we have, and is disputed even by bourgeois scholars. China’s debt cancellations have been well documented, including frequent cancellations to Africa and a large cancellation to Cuba. China frequently renegotiates credit with terms favorable to the borrower.
4. The Breakdown of the Bargain – Hybrid Warfare on China
American anxiety over China’s rise as regional and world power, particularly as an avowed communist power, takes us right back to Brzezinski. Not only is China a rival power in Eurasia (which “must be prevented”), it is a rapidly rising power with a system that seems impervious to economic crisis or political subversion. It is a system that is now expanding its reach through one of the most ambitious geopolitical projects in human history. How does the U.S. empire respond to this?
It’s difficult to pinpoint the exact start of the current war on China. While Obama’s infamous “Pivot to Asia” program in 2012 began to move chess pieces towards China, the U.S. and the PRC have never been allies or even friendly (I’m omitting for the sake of this article the long history of Western colonial oppression of China prior to the founding of the PRC). Even after the Three Communiques, the U.S. continued to sell billions of dollars worth of arms to Taiwan. This is a mainstay strategy of U.S. empire across all administrations, often referred to as the “Cross-Strait Balance of Power” which seeks to balance Taiwan against China.31 The U.S. maintained a 21-year embargo on China after the revolution, a tactic still used against Cuba to this day.32 We now know that the CIA was actively involved in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests via Operation Yellowbird33 and sources placed among protesters.34 Containing China has long been a key strategy of U.S. empire, including militarily. This strategy was laid out succinctly in a 1965 draft memo from Defense Secretary McNamara to President Johnson:
There are three fronts to a long-run effort to contain China (realizing that the USSR “contains” China on the north and northwest): (a) the Japan-Korea front; (b) the India–Pakistan front; and (c) the Southeast Asia front. Decisions to make great investments today in men, money and national honor in South Vietnam makes sense only in conjunction with continuing efforts of equivalent effectiveness in the rest of South east Asia and on the other two principal fronts. The trends in Asia are running in both directions—for as well as against our interests; there is no reason to be unduly pessimistic about our ability over the next decade or two to fashion alliances and combinations (involving especially Japan and India) which will keep China from achieving her objectives until her zeal wanes. The job, however—even if we can shift some responsibilities to some Asian countries—will continue to require American attention, money, and, from time to time unfortunately, lives.
Any decision to continue the program of bombing North Vietnam and any decision to deploy Phase II forces—involving as they do substantial loss of American lives, risks of further escalation, and greater investment of U.S. prestige—must be predicated on these premises as to our long-run interests in Asia.
This memo also lays bare the fact that U.S. military occupation in Japan and Korea and close ties to India and Pakistan have the same objective in mind. What is remarkable is how consistent this policy has been from the U.S. empire, despite its inability to topple the DPRK and its failure in Vietnam. Adding to the U.S. empire’s anxiety, China has been very successful in recent years at peeling away Pakistan from U.S. hegemony (as noted above). If McNamara believed in 1965 that China’s “zeal” would wane in 10-20 years, he would be seriously disturbed by the gains China has made since.
U.S. strategy against China today can be categorized as having three central pillars, forming the basis of the hybrid war:
*Containment: The U.S. is actively building alliances (India, Japan, Australia, SK) while intervening militarily and politically in neighboring countries (the “triangle of control) in order to pressure China’s geopolitical flanks.
*Balkanization: Through overt and likely covert subversion, the U.S. has sought to support separatist movements in China, particularly in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet. Xinjiang is of crucial importance to U.S. strategy given its central role in the Belt and Road Initiative.
*Economic Sabotage: Through restricting Chinese investment in the U.S., the targeting of specific firms and of course the trade war, efforts are underway to arrest the meteoric rise of China’s economy which is on track to eclipse the U.S. on numerous fronts.
Below I will highlight some of the major flashpoints in this hybrid war. Although these situations vary across place and time, one constant has been the trend towards a nearly unanimous anti-China sentiment across Western media. Becoming an anti-China reporter (sometimes referred to as “China watchers”) is now a major career path in U.S. journalism. There are reporters today whose entire careers have been built on presenting China in the worst possible light, frequently parroting CIA and State Department talking points as “reporting”. These “reporters” all share highly overlapping social circles, and some of the most virulent are members key U.S. foreign policy think tanks like the CFR. I have written about the peculiar Operation Mockingbird35-like careers of Melissa Chan36 and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian.37
*2007 – Present: Quadrilateral Security Dialogue or “Quad” Alliance
In 2007, Japan formed an alliance between itself, Australia, India and the United States with the implied aim of containing China’s geopolitical influence. While the different parties of the alliance have denied that the target is China, Chinese officials immediately recognized the significance of the meeting and complained to each.38 In tandem with the initiation of the Quad, 2007 saw the expansion of the Malabar military exercises to include Japan, Australia and Singapore (it was originally a bilateral U.S.-India exercise dating back to 1992). The exercise was also held, for the first time, off the coast of Okinawa instead of the Indian Ocean – a not so subtle provocation towards China.39
Since the formation of the Quad, activity has varied year-to-year. Notable, Australia had backed out of the alliance in 2008 under Kevin Rudd. However, Australia would later return to the fold and in November of 2017 all parties met again. Between 2017 and 2019, activity increased dramatically with the Quad meeting five times.40
*2010-2012: CIA Network in China Exposed and Dismantled
The NYT reported that between 2010 and 2012, China “systematically dismantled CIA spying operations in the country” by killing or jailing at least a dozen sources. According to the report, the CIA “considers spying in China one of its top priorities.” The operation is said to have crippled CIA operations in the country for “years afterward.”41 This can be viewed as one of the major intelligence war developments between China and the U.S., and dovetails with the discovery of a massive CIA hacking operation in China.
2008-2019 (present?): Widespread CIA Hacking Operation Against Chinese Industries and Government
In March of 2020—lost amidst the media frenzy surrounding COVID-19—a well-known Chinese security firm Qihoo 360 announced that they uncovered a massive CIA hacking operation against China since at least 2008. In part thanks to the leak of the Vault 7 hacking tools, the security firm was able to identify CIA attacks against aviation, petroleum, and internet companies as well as scientific research institutions and government agencies.42 The security firm speculated on some potential objectives of this attack:
We speculate that in the past eleven years of infiltration attacks, CIA may have already grasped the most classified business information of China, even of many other countries in the world. It does not even rule out the possibility that now CIA is able to track down the real-time global flight status, passenger information, trade freight and other related information. If the guess is true, what unexpected things will CIA do if it has such confidential and important information? Get important figures‘ travel itinerary, and then pose political threats, or military suppression?
*2018 – Bloomberg’s “Big Hack” Article
In one of the most bizarre and blatant Operation Mockingbird style media operations I can think of, Bloomberg ran a totally baseless article in 2018 accusing China of implanting spy chips in the hardware of servers used by many major U.S. firms. The article was refuted by virtually everyone asked about it and it was never followed-up on, retracted or, to my knowledge, updated.43 One of the co-authors, Jordan Robertson has not tweeted since the article was published and it remains his “pinned tweet” as of 4/17/2020. It’s unclear what exactly happened with this story and it is one of the biggest mysteries in modern media and especially tech journalism. My speculation it was somehow a botched, planted hit-piece on China from the CIA or the information used to write the article was leaked by individuals without proper clearance. Either way, the fact that a major media outlet like Bloomberg was willing to publish a patently false article about China with massive implications if true is testament to the state of anti-China media operations.
*2014 – Present: U.S. Involvement in Hong Kong Protests
Since the 2014 “Occupy Central” protests and their return in the extremely violet outbursts of 2019, U.S. involvement in Hong Kong separatism has been documented by Chinese media and others. In a 2014 People’s Daily article, China accused Louisa Greve, then-VP of the National Endowment for Democracy or NED (infamous CIA front org), of meeting with protest leaders.44 Greve, unsurprisingly, is today a director of the “Uyghur Human Rights Project” – another NED-funded organization based in DC that is promoting Xinjiang separatism. Radio Free Asia and Voice of America (U.S. government propaganda outlets) openly bragged about their on-the-ground reporting on the HK protests and methods of evading censorship.45
During the 2019 outburst of protests in Hong Kong, CCTV published a photograph of U.S. diplomat Julie Eadeh meeting with protest leaders Joshua Wong and Nathan Law.46 U.S. interference in Hong Kong reached its peak with the 2019 passage of the so-called “Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act” which was first introduced in 2014. The act requires the U.S. to impose sanctions on officials engaged in alleged human rights abuses in HK and, among other things, reviewing favorable trade relations between the U.S. and HK.47
*2018 – Present: U.S. Subversion in Xinjiang
U.S.-based “Human Rights” organizations, the NED, U.S. politicians and U.S. media began a massive psychological operation targeting Xinjiang province in 2018. This operation began with claims from the World Uyghur Congress (a NED-sponsored org) that China was putting Muslims in “concentration camps.” These claims have since been thoroughly debunked, as the facilities in question were created as vocational centers and alternatives to outright imprisonment as part of China’s novel de-radicalization efforts in Xinjiang. A comprehensive document has been compiled debunking various claims made about Xinjiang HERE.
What U.S. media of course never mentions is that Xinjiang was the target of numerous terrorist attacks from the Al-Qaeda affiliated “Turkistan Islamic Party” in the 90’s, and that terror attacks continued through 201748 until China was forced to respond with a comprehensive de-radicalization campaign. There have been no known attacks since 2017.
It’s worth noting that the World Uyghur Congress, which received NED’s “2019 Democracy Award” had one of its predecessor organizations, World Uyghur Youth Congress, designated as a terrorist organization by China in 2003.49 In other words, the U.S. government is actively sponsoring an organization which China believes is affiliated with terrorists. As mentioned above, Xinjiang is a crucial target area for U.S. imperialism given its importance to the BRI and the link it provides China to the rest of Central, South and Western Asia (remember the train that runs directly from Urumqi in Xinjiang to Tehran?).
*2009 – Present: South China Sea and U.S. Navy Incursions
While the dispute around the South China Sea has been an international issue for a very long time, the U.S. has repeatedly inserted itself into the debate against China. The U.S. has obvious interest in seeing that China is not able to enforce its sovereignty claims in the South China Sea, given that U.S. Navy vessels from the West Coast and Pacific bases pass through the South China Sea to get to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.50 The aggressive posture of the U.S. in East Asia has led to numerous close calls.51,52,53
*2018 – Present: Technology War Against Huawei and ZTE
As part of the U.S. strategy to arrest China’s economic growth, it is targeting some of its highest value industries including the high tech sector. In August of 2018, the annual NDAA was signed including provisions banning the federal government from purchasing equipment from Huawei and ZTE. It also placed restrictions on Dahua Technology, Hytera and Hikvision.54 The reason given was for dubious “security” concerns. The intent of this action was clear: to drive a wedge between China’s most successful high tech companies and the rest of the world. Huawei is one of the largest smart phone companies in the world and a top Chinese company in several metrics. The situation escalated dramatically in 2018 when Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Canada at the behest of the U.S. She is charged with allegedly violating sanctions on Iran, among other charges.55
*2018 – Present: The U.S. Trade War on China
Perhaps the most telling sign of the breakdown of the bargain between U.S. capital and China is the trade war initiated by Trump in 2018. For the first time since China’s economic reforms, the U.S. government has moved to explicitly act on its complaints of China’s “unfair” systems. The important thing to know about the trade war is that what the U.S. is really complaining about is China’s socialist system. Almost all of the complaints the U.S. has put forward against China are mechanisms that China has used to strengthen its state sector: IP transfer, preferential treatment for SOEs, etc. This trade war is ultimately designed to pressure China into gutting their socialist system.
While a “phase one” deal has been reached between the U.S. and China, the actual implementation of that deal and further negotiations are uncertain. The second phase is supposed to deal with “structural issues” (read: the U.S. wants China to privatize and undo its socialist system) but so far we have not seen any movement in that direction. The COVID-19 crisis may put the brakes on the trade war and its negotiations for the foreseeable future.
The Democratic Party has done virtually nothing to oppose Trump’s trade war, and has instead merely asserted that the U.S. should be taking a “coalition” approach to “hold China accountable” for its “unfair trade practices.” Joe Biden explicitly said this about the phase one deal: “[It] won’t actually resolve the real issues at the heart of the dispute, including industrial subsidies, support for state-owned enterprises, cybertheft, and other predatory practices in trade and technology.”56 There is a cross-party consensus on waging economic war against China.
Conclusions and Looking Ahead
I hope this article provided a useful overview of the background and current situation facing China in the world today. What is clear to me is that the U.S. is feeling increasingly threatened by China’s rise and has concluded that the only way to slow it down is to employ the old Cold War tactics used against countries like the USSR, Cuba and the DPRK. The bargain between U.S. capital and China appears to be coming to a definitive end, and I see no indication that this situation will be resolved anytime soon. For the non-Chinese socialist movement, I hope this information provides a better understanding of the world we live in and China’s role. I hope that more socialists – even if they do not agree with the assessment that China is socialist – will come to view China’s rise as a decisive break with U.S. hegemony, something we have not seen since the USSR. China is the future, and the sooner we all educate ourselves on it the better we will be able to interact with China and its millions of communists. The non-Chinese left has a lot to learn from the experience of the PRC, both in its revolution and its post-revolution governance. I hope I have contributed to that understanding.
This article will be reviewed and re-visited as time goes on new developments unfold.
I would like to thank the many people who have helped me better understand China, socialism and geopolitics generally. There’s too many to list and I would feel bad leaving anyone out, but if you have ever shared materials with me or offered insight on China I’m forever in your debt. Finally of course I can only say thank you to all of the Chinese people and their comrades who have given the rest of the world hope for a better future.
https://www.qiaocollective.com/en/articles/war-on-china
The War On China
JAN 2
WRITTEN BY IZAK NOVAK
3. The Single Largest Threat to U.S. Empire – The Belt and Road Initiative
With the consolidation of the domestic economy and establishment of linkages to the outside world, the PRC now has the task of looking outward and establishing an international base of support. Most importantly, China wants to break the encirclement of U.S. empire that I mentioned above. Only through the breakdown of U.S. hegemony and imperialism can China continue to move forward on its path of socialist construction. The Belt and Road Initiative, first announced by Xi Jinping in 2013, is the leading edge of this effort to establish trade and political linkages throughout Eurasia with Beijing at the center.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is the most significant geoeconomic effort in history, a multi-decade $4-$8 trillion plan impacting 70% of humanity with the goal to develop productive forces throughout Eurasia and steadily erode U.S. power in the hemisphere. The significance of this effort cannot be overstated, as Henry Kissinger warned:
“China’s Belt and Road Initiative, in seeking to connect China to Central Asia and eventually to Europe will have the practical significance of shifting the world’s center of gravity from the Atlantic to the Pacific”26
The more that countries are able to stand on their own two feet economically and have access to their neighbors and China as a trading partner, the less power the U.S. has to impose its political will on countries through economic coercion.
The BRI will link Asia and ultimately Europe through ports, bridges, railways, green energy and trade. It will help historically overexploited countries fill development gaps and reduce or eliminate their reliance on the U.S. and the dollar. Perhaps most importantly, it will significantly reduce the effectiveness of one of U.S. imperialism’s favorite tools – economic sanctions. The more that countries are able to stand on their own two feet economically and have access to their neighbors and China as a trading partner, the less power the U.S. has to impose its political will on countries through economic coercion.
There are many elements to this plan, but essentially it involves both individual infrastructure and investment projects in other countries and the establishment of non-U.S. international institutions. Ironically, the historically negative legacy of U.S.-dominated institutions like the World Bank and IMF combined with U.S. aggression against countries that don’t conform to U.S. hegemony has encouraged even unlikely countries to participate in Chinese projects.
One very significant example of this is the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), an alternative to the World Bank and IMF that is centered on Beijing. Russia was one of the first countries to join as a full member in 2015, during a period in which U.S.-Russia relations were at a very low level and about to sink further following the 2016 election. The AIIB even includes27 many EU countries, Canada and otherwise staunch U.S. allies like India, Saudi Arabia and Australia. China is the largest voting bloc in the bank, followed by India, Russia, Germany, South Korea and Australia. The map of AIIB members is essentially a map of Eurasia, plus many other non-regional members (Green and dark blue are full members):
Figure: AIIB Membership Map from Wikipedia28
China has in recent years moved aggressively to sign deals with countries like Pakistan and Iran on BRI projects and investment. Deals with Iran have been happening for years, totaling tens of billions of dollars in support29 – massive amounts considering the immense economic pressure Iran is under from U.S. sanctions.
The extent to which China and Iran are being linked is visible in the various infrastructure projects taking place. These include:
The New Silk Road freight train route which opened in 2016, linking Tehran to Urumqi in Western China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. The freight route also connects Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Transportation time for goods was reduced from 45-50 days by sea to 14-15 days. This rail line cuts directly through the “triangle of control” over Central and Western Asia where U.S. imperialism is heavily active.
*926 km railroad from Tehran to the eastern city of Mashhad. This electrified railway will be built by a Chinese SOE, China National Machinery Import and Export Corporation. It will cut the transportation time between cities in half and increase capacity.
*415 km high speed rail line between Tehran and Isfahan via Qom, being built by SOE China Railway Engineering Corp.
*263 km railway between Kermanshah and Khosravi, being built by SOE China Railway Construction Corp.
*Railway system connecting Tehran, Hamedan and Sanandaj being built by SOE China National Machinery Industry Corp.
Importantly, the New Silk Road freight train is not going to stop in Tehran. Plans are to have this rail system extend all the way into Europe. For the other projects, Iranians will gain greater economic connectivity between regions. All of this is happening while Iran is facing severe sanctions from the U.S.
Another key element of the BRI in Central Asia has been the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor or CPEC. CPEC is a cornerstone project of the BRI, with the most important element being the development of Gwadar Port in Balochistan Province. This port, made operational in 2016, is a critical element in bringing goods to and from the BRI network, potentially transforming Gwadar into a major regional economic hub. It also diversifies shipping routes from China, which is a key element in upending a potential U.S. blockade. While beyond the scope of this article, the peeling away of Pakistan from the U.S. is a major geopolitical victory for China. Remember that Operation Cyclone – the U.S.-led operation of aiding the Mujahideen against the USSR – was largely funneled through Pakistan’s intelligence agency the ISI.
Perhaps equally disturbing to U.S. empire is the willingness of otherwise close allies to participate in BRI projects. In March of 2019, Italy signed a variety deals with China as part of the BRI. Western media, especially in the U.S, immediately pounced on the news with CNBC declaring it will “only exacerbate tensions between Italy and its neighbors.”30 Reaction was overwhelmingly negative in U.S. media and political spheres in the U.S. and EU.
The U.S. has attempted to discredit the BRI, with commentators arguing that it is placing countries into a “debt trap”. Debt trap claims are not supported by the evidence we have, and is disputed even by bourgeois scholars. China’s debt cancellations have been well documented, including frequent cancellations to Africa and a large cancellation to Cuba. China frequently renegotiates credit with terms favorable to the borrower.
4. The Breakdown of the Bargain – Hybrid Warfare on China
American anxiety over China’s rise as regional and world power, particularly as an avowed communist power, takes us right back to Brzezinski. Not only is China a rival power in Eurasia (which “must be prevented”), it is a rapidly rising power with a system that seems impervious to economic crisis or political subversion. It is a system that is now expanding its reach through one of the most ambitious geopolitical projects in human history. How does the U.S. empire respond to this?
It’s difficult to pinpoint the exact start of the current war on China. While Obama’s infamous “Pivot to Asia” program in 2012 began to move chess pieces towards China, the U.S. and the PRC have never been allies or even friendly (I’m omitting for the sake of this article the long history of Western colonial oppression of China prior to the founding of the PRC). Even after the Three Communiques, the U.S. continued to sell billions of dollars worth of arms to Taiwan. This is a mainstay strategy of U.S. empire across all administrations, often referred to as the “Cross-Strait Balance of Power” which seeks to balance Taiwan against China.31 The U.S. maintained a 21-year embargo on China after the revolution, a tactic still used against Cuba to this day.32 We now know that the CIA was actively involved in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests via Operation Yellowbird33 and sources placed among protesters.34 Containing China has long been a key strategy of U.S. empire, including militarily. This strategy was laid out succinctly in a 1965 draft memo from Defense Secretary McNamara to President Johnson:
There are three fronts to a long-run effort to contain China (realizing that the USSR “contains” China on the north and northwest): (a) the Japan-Korea front; (b) the India–Pakistan front; and (c) the Southeast Asia front. Decisions to make great investments today in men, money and national honor in South Vietnam makes sense only in conjunction with continuing efforts of equivalent effectiveness in the rest of South east Asia and on the other two principal fronts. The trends in Asia are running in both directions—for as well as against our interests; there is no reason to be unduly pessimistic about our ability over the next decade or two to fashion alliances and combinations (involving especially Japan and India) which will keep China from achieving her objectives until her zeal wanes. The job, however—even if we can shift some responsibilities to some Asian countries—will continue to require American attention, money, and, from time to time unfortunately, lives.
Any decision to continue the program of bombing North Vietnam and any decision to deploy Phase II forces—involving as they do substantial loss of American lives, risks of further escalation, and greater investment of U.S. prestige—must be predicated on these premises as to our long-run interests in Asia.
This memo also lays bare the fact that U.S. military occupation in Japan and Korea and close ties to India and Pakistan have the same objective in mind. What is remarkable is how consistent this policy has been from the U.S. empire, despite its inability to topple the DPRK and its failure in Vietnam. Adding to the U.S. empire’s anxiety, China has been very successful in recent years at peeling away Pakistan from U.S. hegemony (as noted above). If McNamara believed in 1965 that China’s “zeal” would wane in 10-20 years, he would be seriously disturbed by the gains China has made since.
U.S. strategy against China today can be categorized as having three central pillars, forming the basis of the hybrid war:
*Containment: The U.S. is actively building alliances (India, Japan, Australia, SK) while intervening militarily and politically in neighboring countries (the “triangle of control) in order to pressure China’s geopolitical flanks.
*Balkanization: Through overt and likely covert subversion, the U.S. has sought to support separatist movements in China, particularly in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet. Xinjiang is of crucial importance to U.S. strategy given its central role in the Belt and Road Initiative.
*Economic Sabotage: Through restricting Chinese investment in the U.S., the targeting of specific firms and of course the trade war, efforts are underway to arrest the meteoric rise of China’s economy which is on track to eclipse the U.S. on numerous fronts.
Below I will highlight some of the major flashpoints in this hybrid war. Although these situations vary across place and time, one constant has been the trend towards a nearly unanimous anti-China sentiment across Western media. Becoming an anti-China reporter (sometimes referred to as “China watchers”) is now a major career path in U.S. journalism. There are reporters today whose entire careers have been built on presenting China in the worst possible light, frequently parroting CIA and State Department talking points as “reporting”. These “reporters” all share highly overlapping social circles, and some of the most virulent are members key U.S. foreign policy think tanks like the CFR. I have written about the peculiar Operation Mockingbird35-like careers of Melissa Chan36 and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian.37
*2007 – Present: Quadrilateral Security Dialogue or “Quad” Alliance
In 2007, Japan formed an alliance between itself, Australia, India and the United States with the implied aim of containing China’s geopolitical influence. While the different parties of the alliance have denied that the target is China, Chinese officials immediately recognized the significance of the meeting and complained to each.38 In tandem with the initiation of the Quad, 2007 saw the expansion of the Malabar military exercises to include Japan, Australia and Singapore (it was originally a bilateral U.S.-India exercise dating back to 1992). The exercise was also held, for the first time, off the coast of Okinawa instead of the Indian Ocean – a not so subtle provocation towards China.39
Since the formation of the Quad, activity has varied year-to-year. Notable, Australia had backed out of the alliance in 2008 under Kevin Rudd. However, Australia would later return to the fold and in November of 2017 all parties met again. Between 2017 and 2019, activity increased dramatically with the Quad meeting five times.40
*2010-2012: CIA Network in China Exposed and Dismantled
The NYT reported that between 2010 and 2012, China “systematically dismantled CIA spying operations in the country” by killing or jailing at least a dozen sources. According to the report, the CIA “considers spying in China one of its top priorities.” The operation is said to have crippled CIA operations in the country for “years afterward.”41 This can be viewed as one of the major intelligence war developments between China and the U.S., and dovetails with the discovery of a massive CIA hacking operation in China.
2008-2019 (present?): Widespread CIA Hacking Operation Against Chinese Industries and Government
In March of 2020—lost amidst the media frenzy surrounding COVID-19—a well-known Chinese security firm Qihoo 360 announced that they uncovered a massive CIA hacking operation against China since at least 2008. In part thanks to the leak of the Vault 7 hacking tools, the security firm was able to identify CIA attacks against aviation, petroleum, and internet companies as well as scientific research institutions and government agencies.42 The security firm speculated on some potential objectives of this attack:
We speculate that in the past eleven years of infiltration attacks, CIA may have already grasped the most classified business information of China, even of many other countries in the world. It does not even rule out the possibility that now CIA is able to track down the real-time global flight status, passenger information, trade freight and other related information. If the guess is true, what unexpected things will CIA do if it has such confidential and important information? Get important figures‘ travel itinerary, and then pose political threats, or military suppression?
*2018 – Bloomberg’s “Big Hack” Article
In one of the most bizarre and blatant Operation Mockingbird style media operations I can think of, Bloomberg ran a totally baseless article in 2018 accusing China of implanting spy chips in the hardware of servers used by many major U.S. firms. The article was refuted by virtually everyone asked about it and it was never followed-up on, retracted or, to my knowledge, updated.43 One of the co-authors, Jordan Robertson has not tweeted since the article was published and it remains his “pinned tweet” as of 4/17/2020. It’s unclear what exactly happened with this story and it is one of the biggest mysteries in modern media and especially tech journalism. My speculation it was somehow a botched, planted hit-piece on China from the CIA or the information used to write the article was leaked by individuals without proper clearance. Either way, the fact that a major media outlet like Bloomberg was willing to publish a patently false article about China with massive implications if true is testament to the state of anti-China media operations.
*2014 – Present: U.S. Involvement in Hong Kong Protests
Since the 2014 “Occupy Central” protests and their return in the extremely violet outbursts of 2019, U.S. involvement in Hong Kong separatism has been documented by Chinese media and others. In a 2014 People’s Daily article, China accused Louisa Greve, then-VP of the National Endowment for Democracy or NED (infamous CIA front org), of meeting with protest leaders.44 Greve, unsurprisingly, is today a director of the “Uyghur Human Rights Project” – another NED-funded organization based in DC that is promoting Xinjiang separatism. Radio Free Asia and Voice of America (U.S. government propaganda outlets) openly bragged about their on-the-ground reporting on the HK protests and methods of evading censorship.45
During the 2019 outburst of protests in Hong Kong, CCTV published a photograph of U.S. diplomat Julie Eadeh meeting with protest leaders Joshua Wong and Nathan Law.46 U.S. interference in Hong Kong reached its peak with the 2019 passage of the so-called “Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act” which was first introduced in 2014. The act requires the U.S. to impose sanctions on officials engaged in alleged human rights abuses in HK and, among other things, reviewing favorable trade relations between the U.S. and HK.47
*2018 – Present: U.S. Subversion in Xinjiang
U.S.-based “Human Rights” organizations, the NED, U.S. politicians and U.S. media began a massive psychological operation targeting Xinjiang province in 2018. This operation began with claims from the World Uyghur Congress (a NED-sponsored org) that China was putting Muslims in “concentration camps.” These claims have since been thoroughly debunked, as the facilities in question were created as vocational centers and alternatives to outright imprisonment as part of China’s novel de-radicalization efforts in Xinjiang. A comprehensive document has been compiled debunking various claims made about Xinjiang HERE.
What U.S. media of course never mentions is that Xinjiang was the target of numerous terrorist attacks from the Al-Qaeda affiliated “Turkistan Islamic Party” in the 90’s, and that terror attacks continued through 201748 until China was forced to respond with a comprehensive de-radicalization campaign. There have been no known attacks since 2017.
It’s worth noting that the World Uyghur Congress, which received NED’s “2019 Democracy Award” had one of its predecessor organizations, World Uyghur Youth Congress, designated as a terrorist organization by China in 2003.49 In other words, the U.S. government is actively sponsoring an organization which China believes is affiliated with terrorists. As mentioned above, Xinjiang is a crucial target area for U.S. imperialism given its importance to the BRI and the link it provides China to the rest of Central, South and Western Asia (remember the train that runs directly from Urumqi in Xinjiang to Tehran?).
*2009 – Present: South China Sea and U.S. Navy Incursions
While the dispute around the South China Sea has been an international issue for a very long time, the U.S. has repeatedly inserted itself into the debate against China. The U.S. has obvious interest in seeing that China is not able to enforce its sovereignty claims in the South China Sea, given that U.S. Navy vessels from the West Coast and Pacific bases pass through the South China Sea to get to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.50 The aggressive posture of the U.S. in East Asia has led to numerous close calls.51,52,53
*2018 – Present: Technology War Against Huawei and ZTE
As part of the U.S. strategy to arrest China’s economic growth, it is targeting some of its highest value industries including the high tech sector. In August of 2018, the annual NDAA was signed including provisions banning the federal government from purchasing equipment from Huawei and ZTE. It also placed restrictions on Dahua Technology, Hytera and Hikvision.54 The reason given was for dubious “security” concerns. The intent of this action was clear: to drive a wedge between China’s most successful high tech companies and the rest of the world. Huawei is one of the largest smart phone companies in the world and a top Chinese company in several metrics. The situation escalated dramatically in 2018 when Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Canada at the behest of the U.S. She is charged with allegedly violating sanctions on Iran, among other charges.55
*2018 – Present: The U.S. Trade War on China
Perhaps the most telling sign of the breakdown of the bargain between U.S. capital and China is the trade war initiated by Trump in 2018. For the first time since China’s economic reforms, the U.S. government has moved to explicitly act on its complaints of China’s “unfair” systems. The important thing to know about the trade war is that what the U.S. is really complaining about is China’s socialist system. Almost all of the complaints the U.S. has put forward against China are mechanisms that China has used to strengthen its state sector: IP transfer, preferential treatment for SOEs, etc. This trade war is ultimately designed to pressure China into gutting their socialist system.
While a “phase one” deal has been reached between the U.S. and China, the actual implementation of that deal and further negotiations are uncertain. The second phase is supposed to deal with “structural issues” (read: the U.S. wants China to privatize and undo its socialist system) but so far we have not seen any movement in that direction. The COVID-19 crisis may put the brakes on the trade war and its negotiations for the foreseeable future.
The Democratic Party has done virtually nothing to oppose Trump’s trade war, and has instead merely asserted that the U.S. should be taking a “coalition” approach to “hold China accountable” for its “unfair trade practices.” Joe Biden explicitly said this about the phase one deal: “[It] won’t actually resolve the real issues at the heart of the dispute, including industrial subsidies, support for state-owned enterprises, cybertheft, and other predatory practices in trade and technology.”56 There is a cross-party consensus on waging economic war against China.
Conclusions and Looking Ahead
I hope this article provided a useful overview of the background and current situation facing China in the world today. What is clear to me is that the U.S. is feeling increasingly threatened by China’s rise and has concluded that the only way to slow it down is to employ the old Cold War tactics used against countries like the USSR, Cuba and the DPRK. The bargain between U.S. capital and China appears to be coming to a definitive end, and I see no indication that this situation will be resolved anytime soon. For the non-Chinese socialist movement, I hope this information provides a better understanding of the world we live in and China’s role. I hope that more socialists – even if they do not agree with the assessment that China is socialist – will come to view China’s rise as a decisive break with U.S. hegemony, something we have not seen since the USSR. China is the future, and the sooner we all educate ourselves on it the better we will be able to interact with China and its millions of communists. The non-Chinese left has a lot to learn from the experience of the PRC, both in its revolution and its post-revolution governance. I hope I have contributed to that understanding.
This article will be reviewed and re-visited as time goes on new developments unfold.
I would like to thank the many people who have helped me better understand China, socialism and geopolitics generally. There’s too many to list and I would feel bad leaving anyone out, but if you have ever shared materials with me or offered insight on China I’m forever in your debt. Finally of course I can only say thank you to all of the Chinese people and their comrades who have given the rest of the world hope for a better future.
https://www.qiaocollective.com/en/articles/war-on-china