Taiwan is in “a situation. “
This is how the Taiwan Affairs Office of China’s State Council viewed the island republic after President Joe Biden signed an aid package that included for Taiwan on the 24th of this month.
Who can disagree with the Chinese government’s assessment of the situation?After all, Xi Jinping is preparing his army for an invasion across the Taiwan Strait and talks about going to war. “Dare to fight” is his new favorite phrase.
However, Xi decided not to fight in February, when he had the best opportunity to do so. Two Chinese fishermen drowned that month after being chased by Taiwan’s Coast Guard. Instead, the Chinese military engaged in theatrical and provocative exercises in the air and sea. near the site of the incident on Kinmen Island, just outside Taiwan. At the same time, Beijing’s propaganda organs exploded and exploded, but Xi did not send his ships and troops to the beaches of Taiwan.
Here’s a conundrum: China’s militant leader constantly talks as if he’s about to attack his neighbors and authorizes belligerent acts all the time, but his current moves aren’t designed to achieve stated goals.
Xi’s moves are even counterproductive, as countries on his periphery, from Australia in the south to South Korea in the north, respond with U. S. cover and spending more on defense.
Xi, in effect, is building formidable and enduring broad coalitions opposed to his China. For example, in 2021, Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States shaped AUKUS, with Japan possibly joining soon. Japan and the US also convened two informal groups, JAROKUS, which includes the Republic of Korea, and JAROPUS, with the Republic of the Philippines.
Because the Chinese leader is behaving in an outward manner that makes no sense (Barbara Tuchman has called it “madness” for countries to adopt policies that are contrary to their non-public interests), we know that everything is serious in the charming capital of Beijing. .
So what’s going on?
There are apparent problems within the regime. Charles Burton of the Prague-based think tank Synopsis told me this week that “a significant portion of Chinese military leaders oppose action in Taiwan. “Liu Yazhou, a former Chinese air force general regarded as one of the country’s leading military thinkers, was reportedly sentenced to death in 2022 (revealed early last year) for opposing an invasion of the island republic.
Since then, there have been major purges in the military, specifically in the Rocket Force, which controls almost all of China’s nuclear weapons. Last year, the two most sensible Rocket Force officials were relocated. At least 70 other people working in this sector are reported missing in the second part of last year. Last July, before the mass shooting, it appears that the head of Rocket Force’s third branch committed suicide by hanging himself.
At the end of December, we learned that five current or former commanders of this branch had been removed from the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress and China’s own highest legislative body.
The heads of the largest state-owned military corporations have reportedly been fired. Three of them were dismissed from their posts by China’s most sensible advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, also in December.
And then there’s something incredibly strange: the last Defense Minister, General Li Shangfu, appointed on March 12 last year, was last seen in public on Aug. 29 and officially removed from office on Oct. 24. His replacement was not named until 29 diciembre. su term is short (he considers it the election of Xi Jinping) and the long and inexplicable period between disappearance and replacement indicates serious disputes.
The discord at the most sensitive level of the army – the People’s Liberation Army is under the Communist Party, not the Chinese state – is accompanied by inexplicable workers’ movements at the highest levels of the political system. Most unexpected is the disappearance of some other Xi Associate, former Foreign Minister Qin Gang. There are rumors that he is alive, as well as that he executed himself or committed suicide.
“The ordinary disappearances of Foreign Minister Qin Gang and senior army officers seem to come out of nowhere, with no viable explanation,” says Burton, who once served as a Canadian diplomat in Beijing. “Its randomness and the fact that the other newly purged people who have been strongly associated with Xi Jinping recommend the start of uncontrollable political turmoil unprecedented in Chinese communist history. “
The political turmoil in the Chinese capital does not bode well for the world. It seems that Xi is taking a page out of his hero’s playbook. Mao Zedong, the first leader of the People’s Republic, continually threatened his neighbors to mobilize the Chinese. other people and prevent his political enemies from attacking him. Mao liked to quote the ancient Chinese sage Mencius about wishing for a country to have an enemy. Mao did not want a war with the Soviet Union in March 1969, but he still managed to provoke one on the island of Zhenbao, which the Soviets called Damansky, because he had ordered the massacre of Soviet troops as a means of unifying the Chinese people.
Xi’s moves are consistent with Mao’s style, a sign that the scenario in China is worse than it seems.
Moreover, this trend warns us that Xi will possibly not be deterred through the United States, no matter how many bureaucratic coalitions in Washington or how many weapons he delivers to Taiwan. It turns out that the Chinese leader is reacting primarily, if not exclusively, to internal pressures. If this is the case, there is little that can be done to prevent the next war in Asia.
Gordon G. Chang is the protagonist of The Coming Collapse of China and China Goes to War. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @GordonGChange.
The perspectives expressed in this article are those of the author.
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