yes. and i think on point. if bao fan not let out very soon, as fosun's guo was after an uproar a few years ago, this whole episode do more damage to confident among an important group of tech entrepreneurs and financiers. The CCDI plenum last month did make clear there would be more investigations in financial sector https://t.co/I168bRtaFO
None of my Chinese friends want to discuss the “struggle” that the government has in store for them. Older friends get right to the point and say that topic is too sensitive and that I shouldn’t talk about it. Younger friends don’t even acknowledge that I asked. I think they all see something unpleasant on the horizon and wish it would go away.
In my view ukraine reflects an evolution of geopolitics where countries have realised that power balances cannot be resolved by economic cooperation and that no one country can dominate an entire supply chain. So countries are starting to calculate how power can be enhanced through tugging on the levers of the international supply chain.
Expect more manoeuvres affecting energy supply, commodities, access to local markets, trade routes, currencies in the form of pacts, policies, sanctions as well as espionage and military operations going forwards.
I am hoping international organisations step up and can successfully create and enforce a proper framework for international competition
Bill (and of course folks here), would love to hear more about your take on the CDF (your #10). On one hand it’s obviously a sensitive time. On the other hand, not even the most Anti China folks in the government are saying most multinational companies should completely pull out of China. Then it’s not unusual to visit one of your largest markets and see how to partner with the government and other leaders wanting to do the same thing?
Rick D. Feb 18 I believe we had take action against China's boldness to curb this form of intel gathering but I believe our gov't should have been more forthcoming about OUR balloon --"airship" -- program over the past half century. If true that the Roswell, N.M. "incident" was an early part of this program it is shameful that our gov't would continue this hoax for so long. We can be informed of our intel efforts without a need the critical intel gathering and technical methods. This practice only makes it easier for the gullible to believe the falsehoods attending the 2020 election aftermath.
Mao's "struggles" won the Revolution, consolidated his god-like dictatorial power, starved ~30-40 million Chinese, inspired the Cultural Revolution, left China's economy in ruins, the Chinese people in poverty, the CCP in power and allowed Mao to die in his sleep.
The PC media (politically conforming / not informing) has told us 1Kx it was a spy balloon, now CNN tells us US intel is investigating the possibility it was blown off course, which is why no one should believe a word about China (etc) in the PC media:
He certainly doesn't appear to be doing anything to improve the lot of the Chinese people, other than those things absolutely necessary to maintain his so-called legitimacy.
I am now hearing about Chinese citizens who are growing increasingly terrified about economics and political conditions in China. They fear leadership is steering the country into another Cultural Revolution nightmare. Perhaps that's Qu Quishan's message.
Enemies abound both foreign and domestic, fantasies like Mao's campaign to eradicate rats in the 1950s, current leadership has "brilliantly"eradicated COVID, cutting health and retirement benefits while raising all sorts of local "fees" to cover budgetary catastrophes is the road to "common prosperity" and so on and so forth..
I fear China is heading for darker times than we understand.
The US should ramp up rather than ramp down. China is engaged in a constant existential civilisation struggle with the west. The US needs to wake up to the fact that China:
Won't stop
Won't forgive
Won't forget
Will be constant and unrelenting because its at the doctrine level, not the leader level. In this respect it is similar to the nationalistic agenda of Russia
The west needs to get real about this. In the longer term automation and multi-sourcing would reduce the need for Chinese labour, but it won't stop the de-facto stranglehold that China is putting on resources from the global south.
China only respects strength, the Philippines is a prime example of what little diplomacy has as an effect.
We're in a time of raw power politics. The US has been looking at power in one dimension and needs to move to a multi-dimensional power approach - while it still has the chance. Given China's involvement in South America, that time is quickly running out.
Bill: WRT what Qiu Qingshan is writing, I would argue that "what it means" is that the Communist Party presently is disinclined to dial down the temperature of tensions with the United States.
This may change (and we may see signals of this in official publications) after the "Two Sessions", but I wouldn't wager money on such an outcome, despite the apparent optimism that Biden administration officials (and the President himself) have, perhaps cautiously, sought to convey.
The incursion of the stratospheric spy balloon into Canada and the United States, as well as the subsequent furore this sparked in both countries, really underscores the lack of trust that currently defines Sino-US strategic interactions. In my view, this is not mysterious--we've been watching "the straws accumulate on the camel's back" for at least four years.
In fact, the rot has arguably been building for much longer, if you count China's disingenuous behaviour in the South China Sea in the mid-2010s, its years-long destruction of Hong Kong's autonomy and the extent to which it has managed to alienate a substantial proportion of "the general public" in Canada, the United States, European Union countries, Australia and elsewhere.
Inept diplomatic management. How is idiotic political opportunism in the United States different from the CCP’s manipulation of nationalism for external purposes any different?
Taiwan:
The central point of conflict between USA and China. Inept diplomatic management times ten.
Iran:
Joint self interest at work.
Struggle:
Ongoing inoculation of the public for upcoming international conflict and economic hardship.
Chairman Mao Saying:
Another attempt at propaganda inoculation of the public but more likely to scare than rally. Sounds great. Let’s jump off a cliff together.
Struggle / Weakness
Back to the well on nationalistic call to action. Another false premise that sounds true. CCP telling itself or factions that there will be no deviation from the current intransigence in international affairs. Another jump off the cliff moment.
"A corruption mess is ripping through the PRC football system, again. The semiconductor development efforts have also been riven with corruption investigations since last year. Xi has made a big deal about the development of football and semiconductors. What if anything does the corruption in two of Xi’s “signature” areas say about Xi and the system?"
To borrow from the French, Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. To borrow from the writer of Ecclesiastes, nothing new under the sun.
"How might parts of the US Congress react to some CEOs of major US firms attending events like the China development Forum, given the current state of US-China relations?"
What are these CEOs thinking? To borrow from someone, idiocy is doing the same thing again and again expecting a different result.
Correct! When is there not a corruption mess ripping through some part of Chinese society? 江山易改本性難移. I think it was Einstein who made the comment about doing the same thing again and again, and he was a pretty smart guy. 好在 the US Congress is starting to look at US investment in China. This should have been done thirty years ago.
would love constructive thoughts on what you would and wouldn't allow regarding investments in a country outside the US by US investors. Since we have not declared war on China, the normal mechanisms for such restrictions and alignment of motives don't apply. It's so easy to say Congress should do x or y - but as someone who is spending real time talking with officials on this topic, it is not as easy as it appears and it doesn't necessarily achieve the stated political aims
The situation must be viewed broadly. On the one hand, if Starbucks can sell more coffee in China, more power to it. But if Apple is effectively a hostage to the CCP because virtually all of its production is located in China, the U.S. government should be concerned and should be working with Apple to enable it to diversify its production base. The U.S. government needs a thorough analysis of global technology and production structures and supply chains and must develop rules, incentives, and disincentives that reduce dependence on China in strategic areas while revitalizing U.S. and democratic countries' technology and production bases.
We are not in a shooting war and we certainly do not want to encourage one in any way, but we need to act as if one could be possible.
I would not want to see the US gvt go the mercantilist route of the CCP, but I am reminded of the caterwauling among much of British industrialists at the prospect of losing the German market prior to WW2, and how they enabled the Nazi war effort. My take is that US companies are doing no one any great favor by crawling after the Chinese market, certainly not in the intermediate to long term. Let it go and let the world economy reset. (Easier said then done, no doubt.)
I think you have to think about the risk of all US-China investments being mutually confiscable. If XJP takes Taiwan, America will freeze all offshore Chinese assets, China will retaliate.
I can't see XJP doing anything other than increased foot-stomping with respect to Taiwan. With (likely) negative economic growth and clear negative demographic growth, the risks are too great. Moreover, I don't see the PLA having the wherewithal to launch a hot war. It has lots of shiny objects, none of which have ever been put to the test. The national humiliation of a very possible defeat is more than the CCP can bear.
Countries invade other countries even when (often when) it is not in their best economic interest. Power, pride, purpose are other major considerations for "men of history".
And what will Chinese mother's have say if their single child is killed in a nationalistic war with Taiwan provoked entirely by the CCP. In my 30 years of frequent visits to the PRC, I have never heard an outcry from local Chinese citizens to retake TWN. This project has always bern political and not based on a threat to China's national security.
We may not have declared war on China but China has certainly declared war on us, ideologically at the very least, judging from the vitriol coming out of China almost daily. If you like we can call the economic war a “competition”. I seem to remember that as early as the 90s the Taiwanese began to scrutinize (and disallow) many investments by Taiwanese companies in China, especially 台積電TSMC. Being Chinese themselves the Taiwanese understand China better than we do and are not stupid enough to simply give away their IP so easily. This caution has served TSMC well because you see where they are today. Semiconductors is certainly an area where we have to be careful and I think USG sees it that way too now. Certainly dual use civilian/military items will have to be looked at and DoD is pushing for that because they are worried about the investments the Chinese are making in both military and space capabilities.
I think that, at this point, the best that could be hoped for would be:
1) Establishment of third-party (non-partisan) advisory body on links between the PLA and particular institutions / companies in China
2) Semi-annual reports from said body that would:
* propose leads leading to congressional / presidential action to impose bans on individuals associated with those institutions / companies;
* offers ideas on audit mechanisms (WRT to supply chains--are the partners in China using forced labour, for example, or are their products and services being used to perpetrate genocide or en masse rights abuses)
To some degree this is already happening, though the approach is presently more reactive than strategic. Not to mention very partisan.
All good suggestions of course. As for partisanship, well I’m sorry but when people start making movies that talk about feasting on my flesh, I get a little partisan. I guess I’m quirky that way.
On Fan Bao, see Desmond Shum’s twitter. Very succinct.
yes. and i think on point. if bao fan not let out very soon, as fosun's guo was after an uproar a few years ago, this whole episode do more damage to confident among an important group of tech entrepreneurs and financiers. The CCDI plenum last month did make clear there would be more investigations in financial sector https://t.co/I168bRtaFO
None of my Chinese friends want to discuss the “struggle” that the government has in store for them. Older friends get right to the point and say that topic is too sensitive and that I shouldn’t talk about it. Younger friends don’t even acknowledge that I asked. I think they all see something unpleasant on the horizon and wish it would go away.
In my view ukraine reflects an evolution of geopolitics where countries have realised that power balances cannot be resolved by economic cooperation and that no one country can dominate an entire supply chain. So countries are starting to calculate how power can be enhanced through tugging on the levers of the international supply chain.
Expect more manoeuvres affecting energy supply, commodities, access to local markets, trade routes, currencies in the form of pacts, policies, sanctions as well as espionage and military operations going forwards.
I am hoping international organisations step up and can successfully create and enforce a proper framework for international competition
Bill (and of course folks here), would love to hear more about your take on the CDF (your #10). On one hand it’s obviously a sensitive time. On the other hand, not even the most Anti China folks in the government are saying most multinational companies should completely pull out of China. Then it’s not unusual to visit one of your largest markets and see how to partner with the government and other leaders wanting to do the same thing?
I think it is normal for the big CEOs to want to attend. I just think that some may get more grief than they except from the Hill
Rick D. Feb 18 I believe we had take action against China's boldness to curb this form of intel gathering but I believe our gov't should have been more forthcoming about OUR balloon --"airship" -- program over the past half century. If true that the Roswell, N.M. "incident" was an early part of this program it is shameful that our gov't would continue this hoax for so long. We can be informed of our intel efforts without a need the critical intel gathering and technical methods. This practice only makes it easier for the gullible to believe the falsehoods attending the 2020 election aftermath.
Mao's "struggles" won the Revolution, consolidated his god-like dictatorial power, starved ~30-40 million Chinese, inspired the Cultural Revolution, left China's economy in ruins, the Chinese people in poverty, the CCP in power and allowed Mao to die in his sleep.
Is Xi taking China down a similar path??
The PC media (politically conforming / not informing) has told us 1Kx it was a spy balloon, now CNN tells us US intel is investigating the possibility it was blown off course, which is why no one should believe a word about China (etc) in the PC media:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/18/china/blinken-wang-yi-munich-intl-hnk/index.html
Think Wang Yi required this reported before agreeing to a meeting with AB?
He certainly doesn't appear to be doing anything to improve the lot of the Chinese people, other than those things absolutely necessary to maintain his so-called legitimacy.
I am now hearing about Chinese citizens who are growing increasingly terrified about economics and political conditions in China. They fear leadership is steering the country into another Cultural Revolution nightmare. Perhaps that's Qu Quishan's message.
Enemies abound both foreign and domestic, fantasies like Mao's campaign to eradicate rats in the 1950s, current leadership has "brilliantly"eradicated COVID, cutting health and retirement benefits while raising all sorts of local "fees" to cover budgetary catastrophes is the road to "common prosperity" and so on and so forth..
I fear China is heading for darker times than we understand.
Sounds like the CCP at work.
REPORT ON RAISI'S VISIT TO CHINA:
https://thecradle.co/article-view/21548/raisi-in-beijing-iran-china-strategic-plans-go-full-throttle
The US should ramp up rather than ramp down. China is engaged in a constant existential civilisation struggle with the west. The US needs to wake up to the fact that China:
Won't stop
Won't forgive
Won't forget
Will be constant and unrelenting because its at the doctrine level, not the leader level. In this respect it is similar to the nationalistic agenda of Russia
The west needs to get real about this. In the longer term automation and multi-sourcing would reduce the need for Chinese labour, but it won't stop the de-facto stranglehold that China is putting on resources from the global south.
China only respects strength, the Philippines is a prime example of what little diplomacy has as an effect.
We're in a time of raw power politics. The US has been looking at power in one dimension and needs to move to a multi-dimensional power approach - while it still has the chance. Given China's involvement in South America, that time is quickly running out.
Bill: WRT what Qiu Qingshan is writing, I would argue that "what it means" is that the Communist Party presently is disinclined to dial down the temperature of tensions with the United States.
This may change (and we may see signals of this in official publications) after the "Two Sessions", but I wouldn't wager money on such an outcome, despite the apparent optimism that Biden administration officials (and the President himself) have, perhaps cautiously, sought to convey.
The incursion of the stratospheric spy balloon into Canada and the United States, as well as the subsequent furore this sparked in both countries, really underscores the lack of trust that currently defines Sino-US strategic interactions. In my view, this is not mysterious--we've been watching "the straws accumulate on the camel's back" for at least four years.
In fact, the rot has arguably been building for much longer, if you count China's disingenuous behaviour in the South China Sea in the mid-2010s, its years-long destruction of Hong Kong's autonomy and the extent to which it has managed to alienate a substantial proportion of "the general public" in Canada, the United States, European Union countries, Australia and elsewhere.
Balloon:
Inept diplomatic management. How is idiotic political opportunism in the United States different from the CCP’s manipulation of nationalism for external purposes any different?
Taiwan:
The central point of conflict between USA and China. Inept diplomatic management times ten.
Iran:
Joint self interest at work.
Struggle:
Ongoing inoculation of the public for upcoming international conflict and economic hardship.
Chairman Mao Saying:
Another attempt at propaganda inoculation of the public but more likely to scare than rally. Sounds great. Let’s jump off a cliff together.
Struggle / Weakness
Back to the well on nationalistic call to action. Another false premise that sounds true. CCP telling itself or factions that there will be no deviation from the current intransigence in international affairs. Another jump off the cliff moment.
"A corruption mess is ripping through the PRC football system, again. The semiconductor development efforts have also been riven with corruption investigations since last year. Xi has made a big deal about the development of football and semiconductors. What if anything does the corruption in two of Xi’s “signature” areas say about Xi and the system?"
To borrow from the French, Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. To borrow from the writer of Ecclesiastes, nothing new under the sun.
"How might parts of the US Congress react to some CEOs of major US firms attending events like the China development Forum, given the current state of US-China relations?"
What are these CEOs thinking? To borrow from someone, idiocy is doing the same thing again and again expecting a different result.
Correct! When is there not a corruption mess ripping through some part of Chinese society? 江山易改本性難移. I think it was Einstein who made the comment about doing the same thing again and again, and he was a pretty smart guy. 好在 the US Congress is starting to look at US investment in China. This should have been done thirty years ago.
江山易改本性難移 True, indeed. 好在 Let's see what the Congress can or is willing to do.
would love constructive thoughts on what you would and wouldn't allow regarding investments in a country outside the US by US investors. Since we have not declared war on China, the normal mechanisms for such restrictions and alignment of motives don't apply. It's so easy to say Congress should do x or y - but as someone who is spending real time talking with officials on this topic, it is not as easy as it appears and it doesn't necessarily achieve the stated political aims
The situation must be viewed broadly. On the one hand, if Starbucks can sell more coffee in China, more power to it. But if Apple is effectively a hostage to the CCP because virtually all of its production is located in China, the U.S. government should be concerned and should be working with Apple to enable it to diversify its production base. The U.S. government needs a thorough analysis of global technology and production structures and supply chains and must develop rules, incentives, and disincentives that reduce dependence on China in strategic areas while revitalizing U.S. and democratic countries' technology and production bases.
We are not in a shooting war and we certainly do not want to encourage one in any way, but we need to act as if one could be possible.
I would not want to see the US gvt go the mercantilist route of the CCP, but I am reminded of the caterwauling among much of British industrialists at the prospect of losing the German market prior to WW2, and how they enabled the Nazi war effort. My take is that US companies are doing no one any great favor by crawling after the Chinese market, certainly not in the intermediate to long term. Let it go and let the world economy reset. (Easier said then done, no doubt.)
I think you have to think about the risk of all US-China investments being mutually confiscable. If XJP takes Taiwan, America will freeze all offshore Chinese assets, China will retaliate.
I can't see XJP doing anything other than increased foot-stomping with respect to Taiwan. With (likely) negative economic growth and clear negative demographic growth, the risks are too great. Moreover, I don't see the PLA having the wherewithal to launch a hot war. It has lots of shiny objects, none of which have ever been put to the test. The national humiliation of a very possible defeat is more than the CCP can bear.
Countries invade other countries even when (often when) it is not in their best economic interest. Power, pride, purpose are other major considerations for "men of history".
And what will Chinese mother's have say if their single child is killed in a nationalistic war with Taiwan provoked entirely by the CCP. In my 30 years of frequent visits to the PRC, I have never heard an outcry from local Chinese citizens to retake TWN. This project has always bern political and not based on a threat to China's national security.
We may not have declared war on China but China has certainly declared war on us, ideologically at the very least, judging from the vitriol coming out of China almost daily. If you like we can call the economic war a “competition”. I seem to remember that as early as the 90s the Taiwanese began to scrutinize (and disallow) many investments by Taiwanese companies in China, especially 台積電TSMC. Being Chinese themselves the Taiwanese understand China better than we do and are not stupid enough to simply give away their IP so easily. This caution has served TSMC well because you see where they are today. Semiconductors is certainly an area where we have to be careful and I think USG sees it that way too now. Certainly dual use civilian/military items will have to be looked at and DoD is pushing for that because they are worried about the investments the Chinese are making in both military and space capabilities.
discerning china foreign policy this way is like trying to discern US foreign policy based on reading Fox news
I think that, at this point, the best that could be hoped for would be:
1) Establishment of third-party (non-partisan) advisory body on links between the PLA and particular institutions / companies in China
2) Semi-annual reports from said body that would:
* propose leads leading to congressional / presidential action to impose bans on individuals associated with those institutions / companies;
* offers ideas on audit mechanisms (WRT to supply chains--are the partners in China using forced labour, for example, or are their products and services being used to perpetrate genocide or en masse rights abuses)
To some degree this is already happening, though the approach is presently more reactive than strategic. Not to mention very partisan.
All good suggestions of course. As for partisanship, well I’m sorry but when people start making movies that talk about feasting on my flesh, I get a little partisan. I guess I’m quirky that way.