10 minute read
Wolf Worries
Strategic Vision vol. 9, no. 46 (June, 2020)
China’s representatives embrace aggressive new ‘wolf warrior’ diplomacy
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Hon-min Yau & Bheki Mthiza Patrick Dlamini
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian has been particularly outspoken during the COVID-19 pandemic.
photo: PRC Government
The novel coronavirus, which first emerged in Wuhan, China, in 2019, has bruised China’s global image. Beijing is agitated by references to the disease as the “Wuhan virus,” as used by Taiwan, and the “China virus,” as it is referred to in the Western World and Africa. As a diplomatic response and damage-control strategy, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has accelerated the use of its so-called wolf warrior diplomacy. This new type of diplomacy is characterized by aggressive statements and reactions by Chinese diplomats and it takes its name from China’s popular series of nationalistic action movies, Wolf Warrior and Wolf Warrior II. In the films, Chinese actor Wu Jing plays a hero who stands up for China’s values and saves Africa from Western barbarians.
While Deng Xiaoping once instructed that China should “hide our capabilities and bide our time,” the assertive nature of this new diplomatic strategy seems to be a departure from his dictum and is a significant shift from the previous low-key, non-reactive approach to foreign provocation. However, people often forget that Deng also emphasized the need for China’s policy to be agile and flexible. The former paramount leader used the analogy of crossing a river by feeling the stones. China has long maintained a low profile because it did not have the strength to challenge its adversaries. China is now much more powerful, and it can now challenge whomever it perceives as an adversary.
Maintaining party legitimacy
In line with the flexible nature of Deng’s river-crossing approach, China’s use of wolf warrior diplomacy varies depending on the venue. It has been used in Africa, the United States, and the rest of the West, as well as within the continent of Asia. Hence the analysis in these different continents will further explain China’s use of this new diplomatic strategy to support the above assumption. The central goal of this strategy is still domestic, due to the CCP’s urgent need to maintain legitimacy amid the negative international image it is earning as a result of the coronavirus.
First, it is important to note that China’s Wolf Warrior and Wolf Warrior II movies portray Africa as a battleground between the United States and China—a battle with a strong moral component wherein Chinese values are portrayed as superior to those of America. This observation begs the question, why was Africa chosen as the background for China’s global image-building endeavor? Contextually, Africa was chosen for several reasons.
Africa is said to be fertile ground for foreign manipulation, as its politicians, military leaders, and top bureaucrats are said to be greedy and corrupt. According to the stereotype, these African powerholders are more often at each other’s throats over fatuous things, as opposed to matters of national interest. They strive for selfish personal gain for themselves, their families, and their cronies. This preconception is a departure from Africa during the pre-colonial era, which is often characterized as having virtues such as selfless service to the people and humanity, as espoused by the African philosophy of Ubuntu.
The values characterized by greed and apathy, among other detrimental values, are most likely to have been encouraged by China, with its wolf warrior diplomacy. However, China’s strategy encompasses
Chinese students hold a rally in Seoul, South Korea in 2008 in a counter-protest against locals’ anti-China protests.
photo: Parrhesiastes
more actions, such as increasing military and economic aid, especially during COVID-19, and includes Chinese language training and academic exchanges, which help increase its national power as it vies for influence in Africa. Chinese investments in Africa are mainly clustered in certain countries. Its diplomatic efforts tend to exaggerate the successes of China’s activities in Africa by framing China’s cultural and political models as being superior, as depicted in the Wolf Warrior movies. Africa was selected due to its strategic value in countering India, the United States, and other Western powers.
“Without Africa,” former French President Jacques Chirac once remarked, “France will slide down into the rank of third world power.” Likewise, World Bank reports are littered with highlights of how rich Africa is in natural resources while battling with corruption and weak state institutions. The degree of corruption there is illustrated by the 10th edition of the Global Corruption Barometer’s findings, wherein most people in Africa indicated that they feel corruption has been continuously increasing in their countries.
It is worth mentioning that this form of corruption involves multinational corporations from the West as well as China’s state-owned enterprises, thus validating Chirac’s assertion. Therefore, China’s diplomacy in Africa supports its grand strategy of countering US dominance and exploiting natural resources. Increased competition for trade with Africa between China and the United States in recent years also indicates that China seeks to counter US dominance near the Suez Canal and other naval trade routes, as
Chinese fighter planes, such as the J-20s shown here, have been more active in their incursions into Taiwan’s airspace in recent weeks.
photo: Sunson Guo
well as in the Middle East. Ostensibly this is meant to facilitate the free movement of Chinese ships with good logistics support and continuous supplies, just as the United States and its Western allies have historically done. This assertion is supported by China’s live-fire exercises on its naval base in Djibouti, which stands in sharp contrast to China’s public statement that the base serves only as a logistics facility. This development demonstrates the symbiotic relationship between China’s security apparatus and its diplomatic corps, with diplomatic strategy being driven by national security, intelligence, the diplomatic community, and information departments.
Citizens in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the pandemic, line up at a pharmacy to purchase face masks.
photo: China News Service
Second, the ongoing war of words between Washington and Beijing—especially regarding the Trump administration’s insistence that since the virus originated in China, Beijing must take responsibility for it—has only fed China’s wolf warrior mentality. Following Trump’s remarks, the wolf warriors fired back, demanding that the United States take full global responsibility for the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa, and elsewhere.
This argument, which seems facile at first glance, is probably premised on the fact that although the United States was among the first to discover HIV/ AIDS, it was not the source of the disease. Thus, by pushing this narrative, China is making the oblique claim that while it was the first country to detect COVD-19, this does not mean that the virus originated in China. This spin certainly has the potential to manipulate how people interpret blame for COVID-19.
Wolf warrior diplomacy has also celebrated the race riots taking place throughout America, triggered by an act of police brutality on an African American suspect. According to some US and Western observers, these events present China with a golden opportunity to fast-track the long-expected downfall of US unipolarity. The tensions between the world’s two largest economies were further demonstrated by the US ban on passenger flights from China on June 16, 2020, which occurred in response to China’s refusal to let US airlines resume flights to China.
Flight bans
As expected, Chinese diplomats railed against Washington’s action while defending Beijing’s decision, claiming that the suspension of US flights was fair because the ban applied to all foreign airlines. In mid-June, flights between the US and China resumed, but the number of such flights was substantially reduced.
China’s diplomacy in Europe has also been characterized by bullying and coercion, as noted by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg. At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Stoltenberg observed that the outbreak had “magnified existing tensions” concerning NATO’s security. Australia is also calling for an international inquiry into the origins and spread of COVID-19, while at the same time expressing concerns about China’s assertive rhetoric. Australia also views China’s diplomacy as an attack on its enemies and a push for global influence.
ROC Army airborne forces train to defend Taiwan.
photo: ROC Presidential Office
Playing the race card
In response, the wolf warriors played the race card, accusing Australia of racism while defending the CCP’s actions toward Africans in China. Beijing did not provide any empirical evidence to show that Australia’s call for an investigation of the COVID-19 outbreak is fueled by racism. In fact, much of the rest of the world was asking similar questions about the provenance of the disease.
Third, in Asia, China seems poised for quick gains while the United States is preoccupied with domestic problems. For Taiwan, cross-strait relations soured at the peak of COVID-19, as both Chinese and US military planes transited Taiwan’s airspace. According to The Taiwan News, on June 16, 2020, Chinese J-10 fighter jets violated Taiwan’s airspace and were reportedly warned by Taiwan to leave. The mission could not be determined, but according to various commentators, this was not an isolated case, as China frequently conducts such missions to collect intelligence and as a show of force.
China’s diplomacy seeks to make quick gains on US allies to enhance the CCP’s legitimacy at home. In India, for example, the border dispute recently escalated as a result of an alleged provocation by Chinese forces. In May 2020, large contingents of Chinese soldiers ventured deep inside Indian-controlled territory. Subsequently, a series of high-level meetings were held to diffuse the situation, and the role of the wolf warrior diplomats was to downplay China’s provocative behavior toward India. In June, the war of words threatened to turn into the real thing as the two sides clashed, leading to human casualties.
Diplomacy is commonly perceived as an instrument for foreign affairs, but China’s wolf warrior diplomacy is targeting a domestic audience. In a scene from the first movie in the series, a Chinese soldier loudly proclaims, “Anyone who offends China will be killed no matter how far away they are.” This line reflects the current nationalist sentiment in China. The COVID-19 outbreak has presented a golden opportunity for China to turn the situation to its advantage through the efficient use of this strategy for the achievement of its domestic policy objectives.
Rewriting history
As the CCP has successfully indoctrinated the Chinese public and skillfully linked its political legitimacy with the survival of China itself, some Western intelligence organizations, in particular in the United States, correctly assert that the primary role of this strategy is to rewrite the history of the coronavirus, in order for the CCP to protect its reputation at home and around the world. In other words, these initiatives are a means to the same old end: the CCP’s survival.
COVID-19 has proved that the so-called global village is also accompanied by grave security risks. Pandemics can travel at frightening speeds in an interconnected world. Similarly, harsh rhetoric can now reach all corners of the globe in an instant. While China’s wolf warrior diplomacy may play well to Chinese audiences, it could be harmful to China’s national interests internationally. China’s aggressive rhetoric has already escalated tensions globally, in particular in Africa, the West, and Asia, at the peak of the pandemic, which is likely to remain the case even beyond COVID-19.
On the positive side, democracy, regardless of its flaws, has again triumphed over totalitarianism, as democracies such as Taiwan have managed to combat the virus effectively due in part to the transparency of their systems. In contrast, dictatorial regimes such as the CCP have failed because of their alleged coverups, which ended up negatively impacting the entire world. Democracies in Africa, the Western World, and Asia will continue to be the prime targets of China’s wolf warrior diplomacy, and so they must strive to strengthen their institutions and work more closely together to counter common threats.
Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen wears a mask while speaking to the press. Taiwan has handled the pandemic exceptionally well.
photo: ROC Presidential Office
Dr. Hon-min Yau is a professor at the ROC National Defense University. He can be reached for comment at cf22517855@gmail.com
Bheki Mthiza Patrick Dlamini is a Master’s student at the Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies, ROC National Defense University. He can be reached for comment at bhekid765@gmail.com
