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The post China’s Power: Up for Debate 2023 appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

In March and April 2023, Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen transited through the United States, during which she met with Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy. This meeting was framed as an alternative to an immediate visit to Taiwan by Speaker McCarthy, and there were hopes that Beijing would not escalate as much as it did in August 2022 when Beijing provoked the Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis after then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. 

China nevertheless carried out significant diplomatic and military measures. Diplomatically, Beijing intensified some of its already-sharp measures aimed at punishing Taipei, while simultaneously softening its approach on other fronts. Militarily, China’s activities were substantively different from those in August 2022, but no less significant. Overall, Beijing appears to have taken a less heavy-handed, more targeted approach this time, suggesting it learned from its experience in August and was better postured to take action. 

China’s More Sophisticated Diplomatic Approach

China’s diplomatic activities took a two-track approach, with some measures aimed at ramping up pressure on Taipei and others aimed at softening China’s approach. This represents a considerable shift from August, when Beijing’s activities were overwhelmingly punitive. It also shows a more sophisticated use of multiple efforts in tandem. 

The analysis on this page draws from ChinaPower research tracking China’s major military and diplomatic activities in response to Tsai’s transit and meeting with Speaker McCarthy. Explore a detailed timeline of Chinese activities here.

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Two Chinese diplomatic activities stand out in comparison to August 2022. First, Beijing appears to have timed a 12-day visit to China by former Taiwan president Ma Ying-jeou to coincide with Tsai’s transit and meeting with Speaker McCarthy. This was the first time a former or sitting Taiwan president had traveled to mainland China. As President, Ma endorsed the “1992 consensus” and encouraged greater cross-strait engagement, and as a result, Chinese leaders have been far more willing to engage with Ma and the Kuomintang (KMT) party that he previously led. 

Ma’s visit to China contrasted starkly with Tsai’s transit through the United States. China likely encouraged Ma’s visit to demonstrate that it is willing to engage with China-friendly parties such as the KMT—even as it engaged punitively to President Tsai and her ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). 

Beijing’s second major diplomatic maneuver came a few days before the start of Tsai’s U.S. transit, when China poached one of Taiwan’s few remaining diplomatic partners, Honduras. China reportedly offered Honduras up to $2.95 billion to establish diplomatic relations with China. This is the ninth time China has enticed a country to switch diplomatic ties from Taiwan to China during Tsai’s presidency, and it marks the second time China has poached one of Taiwan’s diplomatic partners around the time of a U.S. transit. In 2018, China established ties with El Salvador a few days after Tsai returned to Taiwan after transiting through the United States. Beijing likely did this again and timed its actions as a demonstration of its influence and power. 

On other fronts, China took measures in April that were similar to those taken in August 2022. China commonly uses disinformation to put pressure on Taiwan, so it is unsurprising that it did so in both August 2022 and April 2023. Ahead of Speaker Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan, a Chinese group reportedly published articles condemning her visit and used fake Taiwan news sites to argue that the United States would not be a reliable partner in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. Chinese actors also launched several cyberattacks in August, including changing signs and screens to display anti-U.S. messages. In April, China again launched disinformation campaigns, with much of these efforts targeting President Tsai. During her transit of the United States, Chinese consulates in the United States reportedly organized and paid pro-China demonstrators to protest outside of Tsai’s hotels and venues. These protests were in turn amplified by Chinese netizens who also falsely claimed that Tsai had paid the Hudson Institute to present her an award. 

Mirroring its actions in August, Beijing also punished multiple U.S. and Taiwan organizations and individuals this April. Both U.S. institutions that hosted Tsai—the Hudson Institute and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library—were sanctioned. For a second time, China also sanctioned Taiwan representative to the United States Hsiao Bi-khim, as well as her family and investors and firms tied to her. After Tsai’s transit concluded, Chairman of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee Michael McCaul met with Tsai in Taiwan, and shortly after that, China announced sanctions on McCaul as well. Beijing used these sanctions to engage in targeted coercion. They allow Beijing to show domestic and foreign audiences that it is enacting punishments, but they have little or no tangible effect on the wider public in Taiwan or the United States. 

China likewise repeated its use of punitive arrests of Taiwan citizens as an additional show of power against Taiwan. Chinese authorities announced on April 25 the formal arrest of Taiwan pro-independence activist Yang Chih-yuan. Yang was originally detained in August 2022 in the immediate aftermath of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. The formal confirmation of his arrest appears intentionally timed to coincide with the Tsai-McCarthy meeting. Adding to that, the Chinese government confirmed on April 26 the arrest of Li Yanhe, a Taiwan-based publisher. Given that there were no other high-profile arrests of Taiwan citizens between August and April, this too should be seen as intended by Beijing to showcase its displeasure over the Tsai transit. 

China’s other major diplomatic steps varied from last year. Beijing did not announce major new diplomatic “countermeasures” against Washington, as it did in August when it cancelled or suspended eight key areas of U.S.-China dialogue. Whether this should be viewed as a sign of restraint on China’s end is unclear. It could be that there were few remaining areas of U.S.-China engagement to target—seven of the eight key areas of U.S.-China dialogue that China canceled and suspended in August have yet to resume.¹ Instead, China has been reluctant to engage in dialogue with the United States at the highest levels. Beijing has yet to respond to the U.S. request to arrange a phone call between President Biden and President Xi. This request was made public in mid-March after newspapers revealed initial U.S. plans for the Tsai transit. 

On the economic front, Beijing embraced additional measures In August 2022, China suspended imports of Taiwan fish and fruits and cut exports of sand to the island, though these had limited economic impacts on Taiwan. China stopped short of suspending imports or exports of specific goods in April 2023, but it did take some measures: on April 12, China’s Ministry of Commerce announced it was launching an investigation into Taiwan’s trade restrictions on certain Chinese goods. Importantly, the ministry’s notice stated that the investigation should conclude by October 12, 2023, but added that it could be extended until January 12, 2024—the day before Taiwan’s presidential election. Depending on how political dynamics evolve, experts are concerned that China may use the investigation to impose additional economic sanctions or change or cancel parts of the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement that China and Taiwan signed in 2010 to facilitate trade. 

At the same time, however, China continued to signal a desire to increase cross-strait linkages. On April 10—the last day of China’s major military exercises—Wang Huning, the fourth-ranked member of the Chinese Communist Party’s all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee, met with a delegation of Taiwan business executives in Beijing. During the meeting, he called for improved economic and trade exchanges as a means of promoting peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait. 

China’s Significant Military Escalation

On the surface, China’s April 2023 military activities differed substantively compared to those in August 2022. Some of the more provocative activities from the 2022 exercise—such as launching missiles over Taiwan and establishing military exercise exclusion zones around the island—were not carried out again in 2023. However, the latest round of military activities also showed considerable continuity and even progression with respect to PLA operations, tactics, and reach. Overall, China’s military activities were no less significant in April 2023 than in August 2022, with both exercises demonstrating the range of capabilities that the PLA is practicing against Taiwan. 

Military Signaling Prior to the Main Exercises

The PLA’s primary activities began on April 8, with the start of large-scale exercises around Taiwan, but Chinese military signaling began days before that while President Tsai was transiting the United States. On April 5, the Fujian Maritime Safety Administration (MSA) announced a joint patrol and inspection operation of the Taiwan Strait. As part of this operation, Chinese maritime law enforcement officials were tasked with conducting “on-site inspections” (现场检查) aboard vessels in the Taiwan Strait. 

The operation is significant in multiple respects. First, although there is no evidence that the operation actually stopped any vessels, it laid out an example of what China could do if it wanted to escalate. The intended “targets” of this operation encompassed several commercial shipping routes, including the Pingtan-Taiwan direct container route, the “mini three links” (小三通), and areas with heavy commercial and fishing vessel traffic.²This, coupled with changes in Chinese maritime safety regulations, allows China to set conditions for an escalatory stance in the Taiwan Strait and around Taiwan. It also reflects another effort to assert Beijing’s claims (which contradict international law) that China has “sovereign rights and jurisdiction” over the “internal waters” of the Taiwan Strait. Finally, the operation demonstrated China’s civilian mobilization capabilities and its capacity for operational coordination of civilian maritime actors in support of a joint operation. 

Next, Chinese authorities released several announcements of multiple smaller-scale live-fire military exercises. On April 7, the Fujian MSA announced two series of live-fire drills north and south of Taiwan’s outlying Matsu Islands. These were scheduled to occur during and after the main military exercises; however, both of these announcements were later removed from the MSA website, resulting in uncertainty about the extent to which these exercises took place. Around this same time, military drills were announced at other locations, including multiple exercises off the coast of Liaoning Province (well to the north of Taiwan). 

While there are few details about these drills, the flurry of announcements in a short time frame and the variety of locations of the drills are likely all part of the PLA’s overall activities aimed at countering the Tsai transit and meeting with Speaker McCarthy. Together, they served as a show of force and emphasized not only China’s ability to carry out several military activities at once, but also its ability to conduct operations in geographically dispersed areas farther from Taiwan. 

Comparing China's April 2023 and August 2022 Exercises

Following these initial activities, the PLA Eastern Theater Command announced that from April 8 to 10, it would “organize combat readiness patrols around Taiwan Island and conduct ‘Joint Sword’ exercises in the Taiwan Strait, around the northern and southern parts of Taiwan Island, and in the sea and airspace to the east of Taiwan Island.” These exercises were the centerpiece of China’s April 2023 military activities and were reminiscent of the large-scale August 2022 exercises. 

At first glance, some aspects of these exercises suggest an overall scaled-back military demonstration of force compared to August. The April Joint Sword exercises lasted three days, while the August exercises were scheduled for four days and later extended to seven. Perhaps most importantly, the April exercises lacked the highly provocative live-fire ballistic missile launches seen in August. On August 4, 2022, the PLA Rocket Force took the unprecedented step of firing multiple ballistic missiles over Taiwan and into the waters around the island. Five of these fell into Japan’s exclusive economic zone. In April 2023, the PLA primarily focused on simulating joint precision strikes on and around Taiwan, and the Rocket Force did not fire ballistic missiles near or over the island. 

Another key difference was the amount of information released about the drills. Two days before the start of the August 2022 exercises, Chinese authorities released the coordinates for six distinct exercise exclusion zones encircling the island (and later announced a seventh zone). This allowed for a direct comparison to the exclusion zones that were mapped out during the 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait crisis. In April 2023, the PLA did not announce specific coordinates for its main exercises and commenced the exercises the same day they were announced, providing no advance warning. 

The PLA’s decision to provide less information this time is significant for a few key reasons. First, it could be an indicator that Chinese leaders do not believe they need to pre-notify Taiwan or the international community regarding operations near or around Taiwan. Second, it likely reflects Beijing’s desire to prevent external interference by not showing where its forces could operate. Finally, it suggests more confidence in the PLA’s control of air and naval assets to operate around Taiwan without creating inadvertent hazards. It is likely that China will try to set a new norm of increased military operations around Taiwan without prior notification or announcement. 

Looking to go deeper on the military dimensions of China's April 2023 response? The China Power Project hosted a live event on this topic, featuring a panel of top experts. Watch a recording of the event here.

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Despite these differences, the April exercises were no less significant than those in August. There were several areas of continuity between the two, as well as substantial new elements. Fundamentally, both the August and April exercises were suggestive of an “encirclement” of Taiwan using PLA Navy forces, with the objective of rehearsing elements of a potential blockade and other kinetic military operations against Taiwan. 

PLA forces were roughly as active around Taiwan this April as they were last August. Information released by Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense (MND) shows that, like in August, PLA vessels surrounded the island. The MND reported a single-day maximum of 12 vessels on April 10, close to the one-day high of 14 seen in August. Crucially, Taiwan’s MND also released maps indicating that, during the exercises, PLA vessels encircled the island in ways reminiscent of the August exercises. 

With respect to air activities, the April exercises surpassed the peak of activity during the August exercises. On the last day of the Joint Sword exercises (April 10), Taiwan’s MND reported that 91 PLA aircraft were operating around Taiwan. This marked an all-time high up to this point and was considerably higher than the highest one-day total during the August 2022 exercises (66 aircraft). During the April exercises, the PLA also averaged higher daily incursions into the air defense identification zone (ADIZ), as well as incursions and crossings of the Taiwan Strait median line. However, it is worth noting that PLA air activity in April spiked higher and then subsided more quickly than in August. 

PLA air and maritime activity around Taiwan is aimed at negating Taiwan’s ADIZ, and the Taiwan Strait median line and is on track to increasingly challenge Taiwan’s contiguous zone. Incursions into Taiwan’s ADIZ ramped up in 2020 and have become a near daily occurrence. Prior to the August exercises, there were only a handful of reported instances of PLA aircraft crossing the Taiwan Strait median line, but China ramped up crossings in August, and this now occurs frequently. Similarly, PLA navy vessels rarely came close to Taiwan’s contiguous zone—a boundary extending 24 nautical miles beyond Taiwan’s territorial baseline—in August, but China reportedly sent multiple vessels right up to Taiwan’s contiguous zone during the April exercises. 

On top of that, the April 2023 exercises saw far more activity from one of China’s aircraft carriers. In the days leading up to the August 2022 exercises, the PLA Navy’s two operational aircraft carriers, the Liaoning and Shandong, deployed from their respective home ports of Qingdao and Sanya and moved in the waters around China as a show of force, but they were not integral to the exercises taking place around Taiwan. 

By comparison, China’s Shandong aircraft carrier and its carrier group played a primary role in April 2023. The carrier stayed in the waters east of Taiwan for several days before, during, and after the Joint Sword exercises. The Japan Ministry of Defense (JMOD) reported that the Shandong launched a total of 620 sorties between April 7 and 24, including both fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters. During the exercises, a total of 19 carrier-based J-15 fighters entered Taiwan’s southeast ADIZ—the first time those aircraft have been reported in Taiwan’s ADIZ. Many more carrier-launched sorties occurred near Taiwan (outside of the ADIZ), but there is no data available on the specific amount. Although it is far from certain that China would risk deploying the Shandong or any of its aircraft carriers to such a vulnerable location east of Taiwan in an actual conflict, the carrier operations signaled China’s intent and its efforts to practice capabilities to operate near and attack Taiwan’s east coast. 

Access to Taiwan’s east coast is critical to the island’s defense. Military bases located on the island’s east side are key to force preservation, and the island has long sought the option of moving military assets to the east for protection during the onset of a potential PLA attack or invasion. Given the likely intense fighting in the Taiwan Strait in a cross-strait conflict, access to Taiwan’s bases to the east could provide the easiest way for the United States and allies to flow forces or supplies to Taiwan. This is not lost on China. A researcher at China’s Academy of Military Sciences, Zhao Xiaozhuo, emphasized that the carrier group “played a vital role” in showing the PLA’s ability to project power on Taiwan’s east, which would be crucial to deterring foreign intervention in a Taiwan Strait conflict. 

Along with significant naval activity around Taiwan, April also showed an uptick in PLA vessels operating near Japan, according to JMOD reports. Around the time of the August exercises, the JMOD reported seven PLA vessels operating near Japan in the weeks before the exercises, but only one vessel—a Type 052D destroyer—during the period of the exercises. 

By comparison, in the two weeks before and after the start of the April 2023 drills, the JMOD reported 19 distinct PLA vessels near Japan, five of which were tracked around Japan for more than 12 days and three of which were repeatedly tracked for 17 or more days. Some of these vessels included the Shandong and its carrier group, but there were also several other vessels operating separately in the waters on all sides of Japan. This increased PLA activity around Japan was likely intended as a warning and signal to Japan given Tokyo’s heighten concerns that a conflict in Taiwan will negatively impact Japan’s security, as well as its increased military investment and preparations to deal with such contingencies. 

Continued Signaling After the Military Exercises

China’s military signaling continued after the end of the Joint Sword exercises. On April 12, Taiwan’s Ministry of Transportation and Communication revealed that on the preceding day, China privately notified Taiwan that it would close an area of airspace north of Taiwan due to “aerospace activities” related to the launch of an orbital rocket into space. This zone was situated just 85 nautical miles from Taiwan’s northern coast, extended into Taiwan’s ADIZ, and spanned a busy route for air traffic in the region. 

China initially warned against aircraft entering the zone from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on April 16–18. This lengthy period sparked anger, with officials in Taiwan calling it “unprecedented” and Chinese authorities later reducing the airspace closure window to only 27 minutes on April 16. China further muddied the waters when the Fujian MSA announced the closure of the zone to maritime vessels from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on April 16. When April 16 finally came, China reported it had successfully launched a meteorological satellite on a Long March-4B rocket, and debris from the launch was later detected in the announced zone. 

This episode resulted in confusion and left many unanswered questions. It is not clear why China did not initially acknowledge the closure zone until it was reported by authorities in Taiwan. It is also unclear why the initial three-day window was later shortened to just 27 minutes on one day. This backtracking and lack of clarity may have been the result of poor internal coordination, but the episode was widely seen as part of China’s campaign to pressure and intimidate Taiwan. It is also worth noting that the original time frame overlapped with the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting that was taking place in Japan. 

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On top of that, President Xi Jinping played a role in military messaging when he traveled to the PLA’s Southern Theater Command to inspect the readiness of its naval forces. During his inspection on April 11, Xi stated that the PLA should “analyze and address military issues from a political perspective” and called for the military to “resolutely defend China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests and strive to maintain the overall stability of the country’s neighboring regions.” 

Xi also emphasized driving forward the modernization of PLA forces and doctrine, and in a nod to the recent military exercises, he called for the PLA to “intensify force-on-force training based on operational plans.” Xi’s visit and his statements showcase that he believes the PLA plays a crucial role in overall efforts to increasingly exert control over Taiwan through coercive and kinetic means. 

Taken together, China’s military escalation in April should be seen as a continuation of efforts to intimidate Taiwan and allow the PLA to practice a variety of operations around Taiwan. While its activities in April were different in important respects from those in August, they were no less significant. 

Factors Shaping China’s Overall Escalation

It is not exactly clear how and to what extent certain factors shaped the intensity and contours of China’s overall behavior, but a number of initial observations are possible. 

While Chinese leaders likely felt domestic pressure to take action to oppose the transit, it is not clear they faced the same level of pressure as they did in August 2022. There was significantly less coverage of the Tsai transit on Chinese media and social media compared to then-speaker Pelosi’s August trip, when Weibo crashed around the time Pelosi was about to land in Taiwan and many netizens in China were tracking her flight to the island. It is possible that the Chinese public were either generally less aware or less interested in the transit or that Beijing did a better job of controlling public expression of views. This could have created more space for Beijing to act as it sees fit.  

After Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in 2022, China engaged in significantly escalatory activities, but this resulted in substantial diplomatic backlash. This likely influenced Beijing’s thinking this time, and it sought to achieve its objectives while reducing backlash. This aligns with Beijing’s use of more sophisticated diplomatic efforts—namely Ma Ying-jeou’s visit to China and the poaching of Honduras from Taiwan—which put pressure on Taipei and showcased Beijing’s willingness to work with China-friendly elements in Taiwan. 

It is also possible that China acknowledged U.S. and Taiwan efforts to try to address some of Beijing’s concerns and aimed to craft a set of countermeasures to the Tsai transit visit that was proportional to what Beijing viewed as the level of Taiwan and U.S. “provocativeness.” Beijing closely monitored Tsai’s transit and likely recognized that certain elements of Tsai’s transit were scaled down to reduce the profile and public nature of her engagements. Beijing might have also appreciated the attempt by Washington and Taipei to at least delay a Tsai-McCarthy meeting in Taiwan by offering McCarthy a chance to meet in the United States. If that is the case, it suggests that China will continue to escalate against future high-profile meetings between senior U.S. and Taiwan officials but will adjust the level of its activities based on its perceptions of the meeting’s dynamics. 

Want to learn more about China’s activities related to Speaker Pelosi’s August 2022 visit to Taiwan? Explore our feature here.

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Importantly, Chinese decisionmaking does not occur in a vacuum, so other geopolitical factors play a role. In recent months, Beijing has accelerated diplomatic efforts and sought to improve China’s international image. China’s continued support for Russia throughout the war in Ukraine has led to a considerable fraying of China-Europe relations. As part of Beijing’s efforts to restore ties with the region, President Emmanuel Macron of France and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen were in China from April 5 to 7 to meet with President Xi. 

A significant Chinese escalation during their visit would have undercut Beijing’s efforts to smooth over tensions with Europe. Beijing appears to have waited until the departure of Macron and von der Leyen (and Ma Ying-jeou) to announce some key parts of its activities, including small live-fire exercises near Taiwan’s outlying Matsu Islands (which were announced the day that they left China), as well as the large-scale exercises around Taiwan (which were announced and started the following day). 

Broader geopolitical trends may have also factored into Beijing’s calculus in its actions toward the United States and its allies. Around the same time as the Tsai transit, China targeted several major U.S. companies amid mounting economic and technological competition. On March 31, Japan announced restrictions on exports of semiconductor manufacturing equipment to China in a crucial move to support sweeping export controls issued by the Biden administration in the fall of 2022. On the same day as Japan’s announcement, the Cyberspace Administration of China announced a “cybersecurity review” of U.S. chip manufacturer Micron Technologies in apparent retaliation. Beijing has targeted other U.S. companies as well. On March 24, officials raided the Chinese offices of U.S. due diligence firm Mintz Group and on April 28, officials questioned staff at the Shanghai office of U.S. consulting firm Bain & Company. China also reportedly slowed its review process of proposed mergers and acquisitions of U.S. companies. 

These moves are not explicitly part of Beijing’s countermeasures against the Tsai transit, but they likely factor into Beijing’s thinking. Amid heated U.S.-China tensions, Beijing regularly employs measures against the United States in the context of overall tensions and competition, and Chinese officials likely calibrated their actions against the Tsai transit to factor in action along other vectors. Thus, the absence of harsh diplomatic or economic retaliation against the United States after the transit may reflect the fact that China has already taken—or was planning to take—actions against the United States unrelated to the Tsai transit. 

Finally, the approaching 2024 Taiwan presidential election also factors into Beijing’s calculus. President Tsai and the DPP have successfully leveraged past Chinese aggression to their electoral benefit. Most notably, China’s 2019 crackdown in Hong Kong severely worsened perceptions of Beijing among the Taiwan public, which aided the DPP in the 2020 presidential elections. This April, China avoided engaging in some of the activities that would affect Taiwan as a whole—such as suspending trade of certain goods and launching ballistic missiles over the island—but still demonstrated the range of military options China has against the island. At the same time, it embraced measures to directly efforts pressure President Tsai and the DPP ahead of the elections. 

China’s decision to invite Ma Ying-jeou to China at this time was a key part of this. Ma’s trip to China, and his talking points after the trip, likely helped Beijing message to the Taiwan people that Beijing is open to working with leaders in Taipei. It was also meant to show that working with Beijing will bring Taiwan peace and prosperity, while pushing for Taiwan independence will create crises and conflict. Beijing’s messaging sets the stage for how to interpret Chinese actions toward Taiwan and does not rule out the possibility of another major escalation between now and January 2024 if Beijing perceives Taipei is embracing more “pro-independence” actions. 

Overall, Beijing’s escalation against the Tsai transit showcases a China that is learning from its past actions and adapting its countermeasures based on how it assesses the level of “provocativeness” of Taiwan and U.S. activities. China also appears to be sensitive to the potential costs of its actions and is seeking to advance China’s claims over Taiwan using more sophisticated means beyond just punitive measures. Beijing demonstrated its willingness to take firm and escalatory measures vis-à-vis Taiwan, and it is likely to continue to do so in the future. 

Authors:
Bonny Lin, Brian Hart, Samantha Lu, Hannah Price, Matthew Slade

The post Analyzing China’s Escalation after Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s 2023 U.S. Transit appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen transited through the United States in late March and early April of 2023. This marks her 7th transit through the United States during her time as Taiwan’s leader, and is the 29th U.S. transit by a sitting president of Taiwan since the first in 1994.¹ Due to the unofficial nature of U.S.-Taiwan relations, these trips are designated as private unofficial transits rather than official government-to-government visits. Tsai’s 2023 transit is distinguished by an in-person meeting between President Tsai and U.S. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy, which marks the highest-level meeting to take place during such a transit.  

China strongly opposes these transits, arguing that they are violations of China’s “one-China principle” and an attempt to “propagate ‘Taiwan independence.’” In the past, China has enacted a wide range of punitive measures against Taiwan and the United States after such transits. The scale and intensity of Beijing’s actions tends to be based on their perceptions of the current state of U.S.-China-Taiwan dynamics and other linked geopolitical events, as well as the specific details of the transit itself. 

This ChinaPower feature contextualizes Tsai’s 2023 transit by breaking down the facts surrounding past transits and analyzing China’s past behavior. Use the table of contents below to jump to a section of the page.

The Details of President Tsai’s 2023 Transit

During her 2023 transit, Tsai stopped in New York City from March 29–31 on her way to Guatemala and Belize. The following week, she stopped in Los Angeles from April 4-6 as she returned to Taiwan. The most defining and critically watched aspect of her trip was an in-person meeting with Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy and other congressional leaders at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum. 

The New York Stop 

Tsai arrived by plane in New York on Wednesday, March 29, where she was received at John F. Kennedy International Airport by Taiwan Representative to the United States Hsiao Bi-khim and Laura Rosenberger, the newly appointed Chairperson of the American Institute in Taiwan (the unofficial de facto U.S. embassy in Taiwan). In the evening, Tsai attended and spoke at a banquet dinner with Taiwan expatriates and Taiwanese-Americans. In her speech, Tsai lauded Taiwan’s resilience during the Covid-19 pandemic, remarked that Taiwan is “rising in global importance,” and described U.S.-Taiwan relations as “closer than ever.” State and local officials were in attendance, including New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, Deputy Speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly Raj Mukherji, State Senator of New Jersey Gordon Johnson, and State Senator of New York Iwen Chu.  

During her only full day in New York on March 30, Tsai visited businesses owned by young Taiwanese-Americans, and she met with Taiwan expatriates and Taiwanese-Americans at the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office (TECO). While at TECO, Tsai met with AIT Chairperson Laura Rosenberger, as well as permanent representatives to the United Nations of countries that have diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Tsai also met with U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries—the most senior person she has met with in-person during her U.S. transits up to that point. In the evening, Tsai attended a private reception and event hosted by the Hudson Institute, where she received the organization’s Global Leadership Award.

On the morning of March 31, Tsai met with senators Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Joni Ernst of Iowa, and Mark Kelly of Arizona before she concluded her transit through New York and embarked to Guatemala.  

The Los Angeles Stop 

Tsai arrived in Los Angeles on the afternoon of April 4. She was received at Los Angeles International Airport by Taiwan Representative to the United States Hsiao Bi-khim, Chairperson of the American Institute in Taiwan Laura Rosenberger, and Director General of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Los Angeles Amino C.Y. Chi.

Among other activities, Tsai met with Speaker Kevin McCarthy on April 5, with other U.S. representatives in attendance. The meeting was framed as an alternative to an immediate visit by Speaker McCarthy to Taiwan, at least postponing his intended travel to the island. By having Tsai and McCarthy meet during an unofficial Taiwan transit of the United States, there were hopes that Beijing would be more constrained in its response than it was when Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in August 2022.

China used the visit by Speaker Pelosi to provoke the Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis, which included unprecedented military exercises around the island. Compared to the previous Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995–1996, the August 2022 exercises were closer to the main island of Taiwan—with some of the exercise zones extending into Taiwan’s territorial waters. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Rocket Force also fired multiple ballistic missiles over the main island of Taiwan, with some of them landing into the exclusive economic zones of Japan and the Philippines. Beijing also embraced limited economic punishments against Taiwan and cancelled and postponed select areas of U.S.-China engagement and cooperation.

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While there were hopes that Beijing would respond in a more limited fashion, China again chose to stage large-scale military exercises around Taiwan. To learn more about Chinese activities in the wake of Tsai's transit, explore this ChinaPower feature.

The Geopolitical Backdrop

Tsai’s transit is occurring amid worsening U.S.-China relations and growing Chinese concern that the United States is “playing the ‘Taiwan card’ and using Taiwan to contain China.” In February 2023, in a reversal of typical low-profile U.S.-Taiwan engagements, it was publicly reported that Taiwan Foreign Minister Joseph Wu met with senior U.S. officials—including Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman—in Arlington, Virginia. Later that month, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Michael Chase visited Taiwan, marking the second senior Pentagon official to visit Taiwan since 2019.  

In a reflection of deepening tensions, Chinese President Xi Jinping took the unprecedented step of explicitly calling out the United States during the annual “Two Sessions” meetings in Beijing in March 2023. In his remarks, Xi stated “Western countries led by the United States have implemented all-round containment, encirclement and suppression of China.” Similarly, Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang warned that “mishandling the Taiwan question will shake the very foundation of China-U.S. relations.”

U.S. Approaches to Transits

The United States has not had official ties with Taiwan since it formally established diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China in 1979. As a result, Taiwan presidents have only been able to travel to the United States in the form of private visits and unofficial transits rather than official government-to-government visits. 

Although Taiwan presidential transits are private and unofficial, the U.S. government plays a significant role in shaping the nature and content of transits given their potential impact on cross-Strait dynamics, U.S.-Taiwan relations, and U.S.-China relations. The Clinton administration, for example, initially denied then-President Lee Teng-hui a visa but was pressured by Congress to allow him a private visit. In 2001, then-President Chen Shui-bian was not allowed to hold public events. This was reversed by President Bush in 2002, but the Bush Administration began limiting Chen’s activities by 2006 due to concerns of Chen’s policies towards China.  

U.S. treatment of these transits became more consistent under Taiwan’s then-President Ma Ying-jeou, during which he met with local and congressional leaders and held public events. Since 2016, the United States has gradually granted President Tsai Ing-wen more flexibility and time to engage in activities in the United States during her stops.

Trends in Past Transits

Understanding Tsai’s 2023 transit requires situating it in the broader history of past Taiwan presidential transits. For much of the last three decades, Taiwan’s presidents have frequently conducted transits through the United States on their way to and from countries that have formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan.² These transits occur under the practical purpose of needing to refuel during long-haul flights, but they also provide opportunities for Taiwan’s leaders to engage with the United States. Over time, these transits have evolved in terms of frequency and duration, location, and format.  

Frequency and Duration

The first transit through the United States occurred in 1994 and was short-lived. Taiwan’s then-President Lee Teng-hui was scheduled to make a refueling stop in Honolulu while on his way to Central America and South Africa. Concerned about the thorny politics of such a move and the potential backlash from China, the Clinton administration denied Lee a visa to enter the country and did not permit him to spend the night in Honolulu. While refueling, Lee chose not to leave the plane in protest of his treatment.  

In the years following this inaugural transit, the stopovers eventually became much more commonplace and normalized. Tsai’s 2023 transit will mark the 29th. On average, the transits have taken place on a near-annual basis, with some years seeing two transits. The last three years were an exception to this. Due primarily to the Covid-19 pandemic, no transits took place between 2020 and 2022.

Under Tsai, the length of time spent in the United States has increased notably. Some of her predecessors’ transits were measured in minutes or hours, with several isolated to the airport. By comparison, all of Tsai’s visits have included overnight stays and a greater variety of activities. Tsai’s July 2019 transit stretched out over five days and four nights, making it the longest of any transit.

Location

It has also become common practice for presidents to stop in two U.S. cities while transiting. All but one of Tsai’s six previous transits have included two locations, and her 2023 transit will follow this trend. Transits have largely been concentrated on the western side of the United States. Tsai’s 2023 visit will mark the 13th stop at Los Angeles. San Francisco has hosted six transits. New York (five stops) and Houston (four stops) have also been popular locations. To date, there has been no Taiwan presidential transits that involved stops in the larger Washington, D.C. metropolitan and capital region (D.C., Virginia, or Maryland). 

Transit stops gravitate toward cities with large populations of overseas-Taiwan citizens and Taiwanese-Americans. In 2021, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated there were 210,429 people of Taiwan ancestry in the U.S., with the largest populations in California (94,727), New York (18,425), and Texas (16,211). The greater Los Angeles area alone has upwards of 45,000 Taiwanese people, contributing to the frequency of transits through the city. 

It is worth noting that Taiwan’s presidents have infrequently transited through other countries besides the United States. In 2006, then-President Chen Shui-bian briefly stopped in Abu Dhabi and Amsterdam on his way to Paraguay. Chen was denied transit through San Francisco and New York and was only offered stops in Honolulu or Anchorage—locations that were believed to be less provocative to China. Chen ultimately chose to transit through other countries.

Transit Activity

As transits have become more regularized, they have involved more types of activities, especially under President Tsai. During her past transits, Tsai held in-person meetings and spoke on the phone with local and state government officials, some members of Congress, as well as leaders of the American Institute in Taiwan. Taiwan presidents also meet with members of the Taiwan-American community during their transits. 

Prior to the 2023 transit, the highest-ranking U.S. member of Congress Tsai has met in-person during transits was Senator Robert Menendez, who was then ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during her most recent transit in July 2019. U.S. protocol and desire to keep Taiwan transits private and unofficial have precluded Tsai from meeting with U.S. executive branch officials during her transits. 

However, Tsai has opted to have phone calls with high-level congressional officials, including then-House Speakers Nancy Pelosi and Paul Ryan. Although no Taiwan president has met a Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives on U.S. territory, both Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi have met with Taiwan Presidents in Taiwan. Thus, for Tsai’s upcoming trip, engaging with senior U.S. Congressional leaders is rooted in precedent, and in-person meetings with House Speakers have occurred before. 

In addition to congressional leaders, Tsai and her predecessors have also engaged with current and former U.S. government officials. Tsai called former President Bill Clinton during her June 2016 transit. Her predecessor Chen Shui-bian had called then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage during his transit in 2003. 

Overall, Tsai’s 2023 transit is in line with prior transits in terms of location and matches her prior transit in July 2019 in terms of longest duration. The major difference is her in-person meeting with Speaker McCarthy.

Chinese Actions against Past Transits

It is difficult to predict what actions Beijing will take after Tsai’s 2023 transit, but an examination of past transits provides helpful context. China’s immediate reactions to Taiwan Presidential activities in the United States have varied in severity.³ Three main factors tend to affect China’s behavior: Beijing’s overall perception of political relations within the U.S.-China-Taiwan triangle, the specific details of the transit (such as timing, duration, and location), and linkages to other major events.

Overall Chinese Perception of U.S.-China-Taiwan Relations

The most significant factor impacting China’s calculus is the state of U.S.-China-Taiwan relations and political dynamics in Washington. This is especially the case when decisions surrounding transits are perceived by Beijing (whether correctly or incorrectly) as changing U.S. policy toward Taiwan or approaching what Beijing views as “official” engagements between the United States and Taiwan. 

Former President Lee Teng-hui’s experience is illustrative of how China could overreact. Lee’s initial attempts at securing a visa for a 1995 visit were rebuffed by the Clinton administration, which had conducted a policy review that concluded Lee should not be allowed to make private visits to the United States. However, Congress intervened and the administration relented. In June 1995, Lee was approved for a “private visit” to the United States with stops in Los Angeles and then Ithaca, New York, to attend a class reunion at his alma mater Cornell University. This was the first time a Taiwan leader had stepped foot in the United States since 1979 (when Washington formally switched official ties from the Republic of China to the People’s Republic of China). During the trip, Lee had a series of private meetings with local and state officials, and he delivered public remarks at Cornell.  

Beijing interpreted Washington’s move as a major shift in policy and considered Lee’s remarks at Cornell as highly provocative. China strongly publicly and privately protested the visit, cancelled U.S.-China military and high-level exchanges, and recalled China’s ambassador to the United States. Scheduled discussions between U.S. and Chinese leaders on nuclear energy cooperation were also postponed. After the visit, the People’s Liberation Army conducted a series of large-scale military exercises and live-fire drills—including missile tests off the coast of northern Taiwan—starting in late July. Amid building tensions, China continued with additional exercises in March 1996, and the events collectively became known as the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis. Since 1995, there have been no additional “private visits” of the United States by Taiwan Presidents—only “transits.”

Overall, China has typically acted more assertively against transits by Taiwan leaders that Beijing perceives as pushing for Taiwan independence. Beijing worries that a successful transit showcases U.S. political and public support of the Taiwan leader. China harbors deep suspicion of Lee Teng-hui and Taiwan’s Democratic Progress Party (DPP) leaders since him, including Chen Shui-bian and Tsai Ing-wen. This pattern of greater Chinese assertiveness is not unique to transits of the United States. Under President Xi Jinping, China has demonstrated greater willingness to punish Taiwan and the United States for any perceived “pro-independence” moves or actions and generally views actions by DPP leaders in a negative light. 

In contrast, Beijing has largely turned a blind eye to Taiwan leaders it views as more willing to work with the mainland. For example, China responded mildly, if at all, to Kuomintang (KMT) president Ma Ying-jeou’s transits. As president, Ma engaged with Beijing to develop cross-Strait relations, and his administration improved upon communication and economic cooperation with China. Yet, Ma’s stopovers were still diplomatically significant. During his 2013 stopover in New York, for example, Beijing did not publicly condemn the transit, despite Ma’s several meetings with members of Congress and local officials. 

Format and Activities of Transits

The nature of meetings and events also influence China’s actions. Beijing is more concerned with longer transits than short stopovers. Presidential transits consist of a combination of phone calls, in-person meetings, and public events. China is most wary of meetings with U.S. government officials that could be viewed as official contacts and high-profile public remarks, where Taiwan presidents have the opportunity to address a large audience and influence U.S. and global public opinion.  

Geography matters too. China objected the most when transits are through the continental United States in comparison to when the stops are in Alaska, Hawaii, or Guam. Honolulu was chosen as the inaugural transit location in 1994, highlighting the lower stakes associated with transiting outside of the continental United States. In an effort to limit the profile of one transit by Chen Shui-bian, the Bush administration also denied him transits through San Francisco and New York City, which were seen as a high-profile destination. Instead, Chen was offered a refueling stop in Anchorage, which Chen turned down, choosing to stop in Abu Dhabi and Amsterdam instead.

Tellingly, Chinese officials have publicly and privately indicated that the most provocative location for a transit would be in or near Washington, D.C. A move there would be seen as bringing Taiwan’s leader to the nation’s capital, where official business is typically done. To date, no transits have occurred there.

Linkages to Other Major Events

China’s perception of transits are also shaped by other major geopolitical developments happening around the same time. In July 2019, President Tsai made stopovers in New York and Denver on her way to and from the Caribbean. Two days prior to Tsai’s transit through New York, the U.S. Department of Defense certified the planned sale of a $2.2 billion package of Abrams tanks and Stinger missiles to Taiwan, which made the timing of her stopovers more sensitive and provocative to China.  

China leveraged the full range of diplomatic, economic, and military tools to threaten and punish Taiwan and the United States. On July 31, China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism announced it would suspend a pilot program that permitted visits to Taiwan for travelers from 47 cities, including the major metropolitan centers of Shanghai and Beijing. On July 12, as Tsai was transiting New York, China threatened sanctions on the U.S. firms that were selling arms to Taiwan. On the military front, from July 28 to August 2, China conducted drills on both ends of the Taiwan Strait, off the coasts of Guangdong and Zhejiang Provinces. This was the first time since the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis that exercises were held in more than one location at the same time. In response, Taiwan deployed two F-16 fighter jets and fired 117 medium and long-range missiles in its own military exercise from July 29 to 30. Ultimately, however, the situation did not escalate to the level of the 1995-1996 crisis.

Initial Chinese Actions against Tsai's 2023 Transit

This section tracks only China's key initial actions while the transit was taking place. For updated analysis on China's overall response following the transit, including large-scale military exercises, visit this ChinaPower feature.

China already began taking action before Tsai’s arrival in the United States, and Beijing has potentially laid the groundwork for substantial actions during or after her transit. The Chinese government has not censored Chinese netizens calling for a strong response to the Tsai transit. Some netizens have suggested a PLA military response even stronger than that of August 2022. Others have highlighted the increased PLA activities to the north, south, and east of Taiwan in the recent couple of weeks. 

In the days leading up to Tsai’s transit China publicly and privately issued strong and stern warnings about the transit. The Chinese foreign ministry labelled Tsai as “the head of Taiwan independence secessionist forces,” claiming that the visit violates the United States’s one-China policy.⁴ Chinese media criticized the Tsai transit as giving “credence to her pro-independence stance,” “bolster[ing] the collusion between the anti-China hawks in Washington and her pro-independence forces,” and allowing for “a kind of official contact” between the United States and Taiwan.  

Additionally, China has been slow to respond to U.S. calls for high-level engagement, including the U.S. desire for President Biden to have a phone call with Xi after China’s Two Sessions. China has yet to send its designated ambassador to the United States to Washington, despite speculation that Vice Foreign Minister Xie Feng is likely to be the ambassador and that he was supposed to arrive in Washington in either February or mid-March. However, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and China’s top diplomat Wang Yi spoke on the phone on Friday, March 24, just days before Tsai was scheduled to begin her transit. In a departure from typical practice, neither side publicized the call and the U.S. and Chinese media did not report on it until Tsai was en route. While details of the conversation have not been revealed, the timing of the call suggests they discussed Tsai’s transit.

Hours before Tsai left Taiwan, Chinese officials ratcheted up rhetoric surrounding the transit. The spokesperson for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, Zhu Fengliang, firmly stated that, “The so-called ‘transit’ by leaders of the Taiwan authorities is essentially a provocative act of ‘relying on the United States to seek independence.’” In the strongest warning against the expected Tsai-McCarthy meeting in Los Angeles, Zhu warned that such contact, “will be another provocation that seriously violates the one-China principle, harms China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and destroys peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait” and said China “will take resolute countermeasures.” 

As Tsai arrived in New York, Chargé d'Affaires Xu Xueyuan of the Chinese embassy in Washington warned that regardless of whether it is “Taiwan leaders coming to the United States or the U.S. leaders visiting Taiwan, it could lead to another serious, serious, serious, I repeat, confrontation in the China-U.S. relationship.” She describes the “Taiwan question” as the “first red line that must not be crossed.”  

In terms of actions, China poached another Taiwan diplomatic ally, Honduras. Prior to Tsai’s planned transit, Honduran President Xiomara Castro announced that Honduras would be establishing diplomatic relations with China, leaving only Guatemala and Paraguay as remaining Taiwan partners in Latin America. China reportedly offered Honduras as much as $2.95 billion to establish relations. Shortly after, Honduran foreign minister Eduardo Enrique Reina embarked on a trip to Beijing. This is not the first time China has timed the poaching of Taiwan’s diplomatic partners to coincide with a transit through the United States. Two days after Tsai returned from her 2018 transit, China succeeded in getting El Salvador to switch diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China. This follows a broader trend of Chinese actions to pressure Taiwan since President Tsai Ing-wen has been in power. Since 2016, China has convinced Panama, El Salvador, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, and now Honduras to switch diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China.  

Likely at the encouragement of Beijing, former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou is visiting mainland China from March 27 to April 7. This is a significant move and the first visit to China by a former Taiwan President. His visit begins before Tsai transits the United States and lasts until after she is back to Taiwan, providing Beijing with flexibility to engage with him after seeing the full nature of Tsai’s transit. Ma remains a senior member of the KMT party, the leading opposition party to Tsai’s ruling DPP.  

Additionally, Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense reported that on March 31 (Taiwan time), nine PLA aircraft crossed the northern, central, and southern areas of the Taiwan Strait median line in five batches.

Appendix: Details of Tsai Ing-wen’s Past Transits

The section below includes key information for each of Tsai Ing-wen’s six previous transits of the United States, including actions that China took during or immediately (two weeks) prior to or after her transit.

Authors:
Bonny Lin, Brian Hart, Samantha Lu, Hannah Price, Matthew Slade

The post Putting Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s 2023 U.S. Transit in Context appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

November 17, 2022 Debates and Keynote Remarks

9:00 am – 9:05 am: Welcome Remarks

Dr. Bonny Lin
Director, China Power Project and senior fellow, Asian Security, CSIS

9:05 am – 9:35 am: Keynote Remarks

Senator Edward J. Markey (D-MA)
Chairman, Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy

9:35 am – 10:50 am: Debate

Proposition: China’s “new normal” of increased military activities in the Taiwan Strait is likely to lead to a US-China or China-Taiwan crisis/conflict in the next year or two

FOR: Mr. John K. Culver
Nonresident senior fellow, Global China Hub, Atlantic Council;
Former senior intelligence officer, Central Intelligence Agency

AGAINST: Dr. Alexander Huang
Chairman and CEO, Council on Strategic & Wargaming Studies;
Special advisor to the chairman and director of International Affairs, Kuomintang (KMT)

10:50 am – 11:00 am: Break

11:00 am – 12:15 pm: Discussion

Proposition: Beijing views a strong China-Russia relationship as a net strategic asset 

Dr. Dave Shullman
Senior director, Global China Hub, Atlantic Council
 
Ms. Yun Sun
Senior fellow and co-director, East Asia Program and director, China Program, the Stimson Center

12:15 pm – 12:20 pm: Closing Remarks

Dr. Bonny Lin

January 24, 2023 Debate

Proposition: China can work with the United States to provide cooperative global economic leadership to help the world economy function effectively.

FOR: Dr. Fred Bergsten
Nonresident Senior Fellow and Director Emeritus
Peterson Institute for International Economics

AGAINST: Mr. Daniel Rosen
Partner, Rhodium Group
Senior Associate (Non-resident), Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics, CSIS

The post China’s Power: Up for Debate appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

As China’s recent unprecedented military exercises around Taiwan demonstrated, the Taiwan Strait is a major flashpoint that threatens to undermine regional and global stability. Yet crucial questions remain about the dynamics shaping the Taiwan Strait. What is China’s approach to Taiwan and how long is Beijing willing to wait for Taiwan’s unification? Will China use significant military force against Taiwan, and when? How does Beijing view the potential of U.S. intervention in a Taiwan contingency?

To shed light on these questions, ChinaPower polled 64 leading experts on the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Taiwan, and cross-Strait relations.¹ The experts polled include 28 former high-level U.S. government (USG) officials from both Democrat and Republican administrations, as well as 23 former USG policy and intelligence analysts and 13 top experts from academia and think tanks.² Responses were collected from August 10–September 8, 2022, amid the Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis.

Key takeaways from the survey are shown below. Click a tile to jump to the corresponding section for additional insights and analysis. Click here to jump to the conclusion section. You can also download supporting documents using the links below.

Downloads:

• Click here to download a PDF of the full feature.
• Click here to download a two-page summary of the survey findings.
• Click here to download a PDF of the survey questionnaire.

China’s Strategy for Taiwan

At the most basic level, China’s overall approach to Taiwan hinges on two main questions: does China have a clear strategy to achieve unification and how patiently is it willing to wait? The experts polled by our survey broadly believe that Beijing does not have a strategy and that it is willing to wait to achieve unification—but not forever.

Asked whether Beijing has “a coherent internal strategy and roadmap, with concrete stages and actionable next steps,” 80 percent of respondents said “no.” There was no significant difference in responses to this question based on the identity of the respondents: former senior USG officials and other respondents broadly agree on the matter.

The general assessment that China lacks a coherent strategy is a reflection of public opinion polls in Taiwan, which consistently show that Taiwan’s citizens are not interested in unification with China. Under President Tsai Ing-wen, Taipei has also rejected China’s proposed “one country, two systems” offer and watched as Beijing cracked down on Hong Kong and reversed promises of autonomy for the Chinese special administrative region. China’s inability to win the hearts and minds of the Taiwan government and people has led Beijing to increasingly leverage coercive tools against the island, including threats to use significant military force. These dynamics raise serious questions as to whether China has a coherent strategy for peaceful unification with Taiwan.

Linked to China’s overall strategy are Beijing’s assessments of the necessary conditions for unification with the island. Only 10 percent of respondents think Beijing’s approach is to push for unification “at the earliest possible opportunity.” The overwhelming majority (84 percent) of respondents say “Beijing is willing to wait for unification but will not accept the status quo permanently.” For this group, there is likely an assessment that Beijing is willing to wait because the conditions—political, economic, or military—are not yet optimal for China to achieve peaceful or forceful unification. Only 6 percent believe Beijing is willing to permanently accept the status quo—wherein Taiwan is self-governed but Taipei has not declared independence—and none of the 64 respondents think that China would ever accept Taiwan independence.

China's Timeline for Unification

Some of the most hotly debated questions revolve around China’s timeline for unification. These questions are crucial, since a desire by Beijing to stick to a certain timeline could compel China to ramp up coercive measures or even military attacks to achieve its objectives.

When asked if Beijing has set a “hard internal deadline for resolving the Taiwan issue,” 44 percent of respondents said Beijing has set a hard deadline to achieve unification by 2049. This is not an arbitrary year. Authoritative Chinese sources, including the 2022 white paper on Taiwan, have closely linked Taiwan’s unification with the concept of “national rejuvenation”—a nebulous goal that Chinese leaders aim to achieve by 2049 to mark the centennial of the PRC’s founding.

Some experts believe that 2049 is only a soft benchmark for China and not a hard deadline. As a result, some selected 2072 as the hard deadline for China to achieve unification, believing that 50 years from 2022 is the longest time China could give itself. Others (42 percent) selected the option that Beijing is willing to wait indefinitely as long as it still sees unification as possible.

Since experts do not formulate their assessments in a vacuum, the poll sought to gauge whether China’s recent unprecedented military exercises around Taiwan reflect changes in Beijing’s timelines. A large majority (80 percent) believe that the recent exercises do not indicate that China is accelerating its timeline for using large-scale military force against Taiwan. Notably, however, 29 percent of former senior USG officials believe the exercises do indicate a timeline shift while only 14 percent of other respondents hold that view.

Xi Jinping’s Third Term

China’s approach toward Taiwan over the next five years will be heavily shaped by Chinese leader Xi Jinping. He is China’s most powerful leader in generations, and he has abolished the two term limit on his power. Xi is set to begin his third five-year term in October 2022.

Under Xi, China has significantly ramped up pressure on Taiwan. There has been U.S. and international media speculation that the year 2027—which will mark the end of Xi’s third term and also the centennial of the founding of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA)—is a likely time period by which Xi will decide to use force against Taiwan to achieve unification. Xi’s own statements have also been interpreted by some as an indication that he seeks to resolve the Taiwan issue under his watch. In 2013 and 2019, Xi commented that the Taiwan issue should not be passed down from generation to generation. Yet he has been careful to not explicitly and publicly specify a date by which China needs to unify with Taiwan or use force against the island.

The experts polled by our survey broadly rejected the idea that China must act against Taiwan by 2027. About 83 percent of respondents assess that China does not plan to use significant kinetic military force against Taiwan by 2027.

China’s lack of a plan to use significant military force against Taiwan does not mean that Beijing will sit idly by. Indeed, 79 percent of respondents assess that Xi will move beyond a more passive focus on deterring perceived Taiwan independence and instead prioritize making progress toward peaceful unification during his third term. This means that Beijing will need to be much more active—and likely more coercive—toward Taiwan to create the conditions for unification. This could involve more unilateral moves on Beijing’s end to impose its sovereignty and control over the island.

Only 9 percent of respondents believe that Xi feels China has exhausted all peaceful options and will feel compelled in his third term to unify Taiwan through coercive measures or military force. This corresponds closely to the 9 percent that believe Beijing will seek unification at the earliest possible opportunity (See above in the section on “China’s Strategy for Taiwan”).

The Risk of a Taiwan Contingency

As cross-Strait tensions have flared in recent years, so has the likelihood of a military conflict or accident. Three of the survey’s questions sought to gauge experts’ assessments about the risks of various military contingencies in the next ten years. Their responses indicate a belief that a full amphibious invasion of Taiwan is possible—but more unlikely than not—while a more limited Chinese use of force and a military accident are fairly likely.

Asked how likely it is that China will engage in an amphibious invasion of Taiwan in the next ten years, 63 percent of experts responded that it is possible. Another 27 percent feel an invasion is unlikely. Only 8 percent think an invasion is likely.

Based on responses to other questions in the survey, these results indicate that most experts do not believe China proactively seeks to invade Taiwan in the next ten years. Instead, Beijing could feel compelled to do so if China views Taiwan or the United States as crossing unacceptable redlines.

While experts were unsure about the likelihood of an amphibious invasion, they were much more willing to believe that in the next 10 years China would “deliberately escalate its use of force short of invasion,” for example by blockading Taiwan. A slight majority believe that such a scenario is either likely (30 percent) or very likely (22 percent). However, a plurality (44 percent) still view this as possible. Only 5 percent believe it is unlikely and no experts believe it is not at all likely.

Respondents were even more likely to think that an “unintended military accident or collision will take place in or near the Taiwan Strait.” While a plurality (39 percent) still believe an accident or collision is possible, 34 percent believe such a scenario is likely and 22 percent believe it is very likely. Only 5 percent believe it is unlikely and no experts believe it is not at all likely. Notably, there were not major differences in views between former senior officials and other respondents.

Potential Chinese Responses to U.S. and Taiwan Actions

Also important to China’s plans for Taiwan is how China might respond to potential U.S. and Taiwan actions. Beijing could feel that it must respond by using military force. Respondents largely agree that China would invade if Taiwan declared independence and that Beijing would respond strongly and negatively if Washington dropped its long-held approach of strategic ambiguity.

Over the years, Beijing has repeatedly made known its objection to Taiwan independence. The PLA’s unprecedented August 2022 exercises were targeted at deterring “separatist activities” on the island, and Beijing has taken other measures such as sanctioning Taiwan officials that it has labeled “independence diehards.”

Survey respondents appear to take Beijing’s concerns seriously. More than three-quarters of the experts polled said that China would invade Taiwan immediately (within six months) if Taipei declared independence. There was little variation in this belief among different groups of respondents. Compared to other respondents, former senior USG officials were only slightly more likely to say China would invade (79 percent versus 75 percent). Even among the 23 percent that do not believe China would invade Taiwan immediately, some still believe that China could use significant force against Taiwan. This could involve launching a blockade or engaging in unprecedented, large military exercises targeting Taiwan.

Respondents were somewhat more sanguine about how Beijing would respond to a decision by Washington to end its long-held policy of strategic ambiguity—a policy wherein the United States does not say whether or not it would come to Taiwan’s defense. None of the polled experts believe China would respond to an end of strategic ambiguity by immediately invading Taiwan. Instead, 64 percent of polled experts expect that China would “respond negatively and significantly, provoking a U.S.-China or China-Taiwan crisis.” An additional 31 percent say that China would instead “respond negatively in a more limited way,” mainly lodging diplomatic protests.

Only two respondents believe that an official U.S. policy shift to defend Taiwan would deter China from using force against Taiwan, and only one respondent assesses that China would not respond to the U.S. policy change.  As shown in the next section, most experts do not believe ending U.S. strategic ambiguity would deter China from using force against Taiwan because Beijing already assumes that the U.S. military would come to Taiwan’s defense. Instead, Beijing is likely to view a change in U.S. policy as further provocation and as an effort to support Taiwan independence.

Chinese Thinking on U.S. Resolve

Experts polled in this survey think Beijing already assumes the United States will intervene militarily to defend Taiwan. Many also believe that Chinese leaders fear the U.S. still has a military advantage. 

Survey participants were asked to assess how far Beijing expects the United States would be willing to go to defend Taiwan in the event of an unprovoked Chinese invasion of Taiwan. They were given multiple options ranging from providing no support for Taiwan to bearing any military costs to defend the island. None of the experts assess that China believes Washington will provide no support or simply stop at political and economic aid. All respondents think China believes the United States would be willing to also deploy troops in Taiwan’s defense.

Experts diverge, however, on how far the United States would be willing to go to defend Taiwan. About 30 percent believe China assesses the United States is willing to deploy troops to defend Taiwan but is not willing to bear significant costs. Most respondents (66 percent) think Beijing has assessed that the United States is willing to go further by bearing substantial costs but will seek to contain the military conflict to the Indo-Pacific region. The remaining 5 percent think China sees the U.S. as willing to risk any cost, including a global war and attacks on the continental United States.

Importantly, these responses were specifically about a scenario in which the PLA launches an “unprovoked” invasion. If Taiwan were to provoke a Chinese attack by unilaterally declaring independence or by escalating through a preemptive military strike, Washington may be far less willing to come to Taiwan’s aid. Beijing is aware of this, and a different scenario would therefore likely be interpreted differently by Chinese leaders.

The widespread belief that China anticipates a U.S. military response is notable given that most respondents also think Beijing is uncertain about its capabilities vis-à-vis the United States. In the context of a Chinese amphibious invasion scenario in the next five years, about 41 percent believe Beijing is uncertain about U.S. capabilities but think Beijing “has confidence in its growing military capabilities.” This reflects the fact that China has invested significant resources to train and modernize the PLA.  

At the same time, the PLA has not engaged in a major conventional conflict since the China-Vietnam war in 1979 and an amphibious invasion of Taiwan would amount to an extremely complex and difficult military operation. Most respondents (55 percent) consequently think that Beijing believes the United States still has a military advantage, indicating a belief that the United States and its allies could mount a considerable defense of Taiwan. Only 2 percent say that Beijing believes the United States could not repel a Chinese invasion.

Conclusion

The results of this survey offer valuable insights into the thinking of many of the leading experts on cross-Strait dynamics and Indo-Pacific security issues—including those who have shaped not only public discourse but also U.S. government policy. Taken together, their views suggest a consensus along the following lines:

1. China is determined to unify with Taiwan, but Beijing does not have a coherent strategy. Experts in the poll unanimously agree that Beijing will not accept Taiwan’s independence. At the same time, most experts assess that China does not have a coherent strategy for unification.
2. China is willing to wait to unify with Taiwan, and the August 2022 exercises are not an indicator of accelerated PRC timelines. Most respondents believe Beijing is willing to wait decades—or even indefinitely—to achieve its goals. Experts are split nearly evenly over whether China has set a hard deadline to achieve unification by 2049 or whether it is willing to wait indefinitely. Only a small share of experts believe China has a hard deadline to unify Taiwan in the next 15 years or less. Most do not view China’s unprecedented military exercise in August 2022 as an indicator that China has accelerated its timeline to use force against Taiwan.
3. Xi Jinping feels there are still avenues to peaceful unification. A large majority of experts believe Xi will prioritize making progress on peaceful unification during his third term (2022–2027). Few experts—and no former senior U.S. government officials—believe Xi has concluded that China has exhausted all peaceful options. Most respondents reject speculation that Xi intends to use force against Taiwan by 2027. 
4. The potential for a military crisis or conflict in the Taiwan Strait is very real. While very few think a full amphibious invasion of Taiwan is likely in the next ten years, a majority say it is possible. Other scenarios short of an invasion—such as a blockade or a military accident or collision—are likelier than not in the next decade. 
5. China would immediately invade if Taiwan declared independence. Experts were largely in agreement that a declaration of independence would provoke an invasion. China would respond more limitedly—but still negatively and strongly—to an ending of U.S. strategic ambiguity, likely by provoking a crisis.
6. China assumes that the United States would intervene in a Taiwan conflict. Experts in the survey unanimously agree that Beijing assumes the U.S. military would deploy forces to intervene and defend Taiwan in a conflict, and a slight majority of experts think Beijing still worries that the United States has a military edge. Accordingly, almost no respondents believe that ending the U.S. policy of strategic ambiguity would deter China from using force against Taiwan, since Beijing already assumes Washington will intervene. 

Survey Participants

A total of 64 respondents participated in this survey. The individuals listed below gave permission to publicly acknowledge their participation. An additional four respondents participated but did not wish for their names to be listed publicly. 

Jeff Benson, Jude Blanchette, Dennis J. Blasko, Richard Bush, Jean-Pierre Cabestan, Elbridge Colby, Zack Cooper, Ralph Cossa, John K. Culver, Fiona Cunningham, Richard Danzig, Brian Davis, Gerard DiPippo, Lukas Filler, David Finkelstein, Michele Flournoy, M. Taylor Fravel, Bonnie Glaser, Michael J. Green, Derek Grossman, Kristen Gunness, Paul Haenle, Ryan Hass, Paul Heer, Lonnie Henley, Charles Hooper, Russell Hsiao, Michael A. Hunzeker, Christopher Johnstone, Shirley Kan, Ivan Kanapathy, Isaac Kardon, David Keegan, Scott Kennedy, William Klein, Matthew Kroenig, Roderick Lee, Kenneth Lieberthal, Bonny Lin, Shirley Lin, Oriana Skylar Mastro, Evan Medeiros, Lyle Morris, Dan Peck, Shelley Rigger, J. Stapleton Roy, David Sacks, Brent Sadler, Chad Sbragia, Andrew Scobell, David B. Shear, Thomas Shugart, David Stilwell, Mark Stokes, Robert Sutter, Scott Swift, Kharis Templeman, Christopher Twomey, James Winnefeld, Joel Wuthnow

Authors:
Bonny Lin, Brian Hart, Matthew P. Funaiole, Samantha Lu, Hannah Price, Nicholas Kaufman

The post Surveying the Experts: China’s Approach to Taiwan appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

China has largely eschewed formal alliances, but over the years Beijing has increasingly courted close ties with Russia. On February 4, 2022, just weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Beijing and issued a historic joint statement emphasizing that the bilateral relationship has “no limits,” and that “there are no ‘forbidden’ areas of cooperation” between them.

Why did China commit to the relationship at such a pivotal moment? Why did Beijing double down on the relationship by refusing to criticize the Russian invasion of Ukraine? This ChinaPower feature explores how the relationship came to be so close, up until the time of the invasion. This analysis centers on five key ways in which China benefits from the relationship, each of which is examined in detail:

• Russia supports China’s core interests;
• Vladimir Putin personally supports Xi Jinping and his key initiatives;
• Russia helps to magnify China’s global reach at the expense of Western influence;
• Russia enhances China’s military power through arms sales and joint military exercises; and
• Russia assists China in meeting important economic and energy needs.

Supporting China’s Core Interests

The China-Russia relationship is founded, first and foremost, on mutual respect and accommodation of each side’s core interests. For China, this means accepting China’s authoritarian political system, supporting (or not opposing) China’s sovereignty and territorial claims, and aiding China in maintaining stability on its periphery. Without these preconditions, the relationship would not be as close as it is.

While the Chinese and Russian political systems are meaningfully different, they share similar tendencies toward authoritarianism. Moscow’s acceptance and support of China’s basic political system, and its attempts to legitimize alternative, non-Western visions of democracy and human rights, made it possible for Russia to deepen relations with China as Western countries criticized Beijing on human rights issues.

Also crucial to Beijing’s core interests is Russia’s support or acceptance of Chinese sovereignty claims. During the 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, Moscow blamed Taiwan and the United States for heightened tensions and refrained from criticizing China for conducting military exercises and missile launches near Taiwan. In the 2001 China-Russia Treaty of Good Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation, Russia endorsed Beijing’s One-China Principle and stated that it “opposes any form of Taiwan’s independence.” Russia has continued to support Beijing’s stance on Taiwan, including in the February 4, 2022, joint statement.

Beyond Taiwan, Moscow has supported Beijing’s draconian policies toward Hong Kong, Tibet, and Xinjiang, and it has even appeared to signal support for Chinese claims over the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands that Japan also claims—most notably through a joint China-Russia bomber patrol near the islands in 2019. Russia has remained officially neutral on disputed Chinese claims in the South China Sea, but it has tacitly supported China by criticizing “non-regional powers” (i.e., the United States) for involving themselves in the region, and Russia even joined China in a naval exercise in the South China Sea in 2016 after an international tribunal sided with the Philippines and ruled against Chinese claims in the South China Sea.

China has reciprocated by supporting or not opposing Russian activities and claims. Beijing has largely avoided criticizing Russian military activities in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria, and Ukraine, and it has tacitly sided with Russian claims over the Kuril Islands, which Japan disputes.

Russia has further supported Beijing’s core interests by cooperating with China to shape favorable security dynamics along their shared periphery. The two countries cooperated in the 1990s and 2000s to resolve their decades-old border dispute, which eliminated a long-existing irritant in the bilateral relationship and set the stage for the two nuclear neighbors to view each other as strategic partners instead of rivals. It also freed up Beijing’s political attention and military resources to focus on other pressing concerns along China’s periphery.

Russia is a core member of the China-headquartered Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which comprises eight Member States (China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Pakistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan), as well as four Observer States and six Dialogue Partners.¹ The SCO has provided a platform for China and Russia to coordinate their interests and manage competition in Central Asia and connected regions. The two countries have also used the SCO as a platform to cooperate on anti-terrorism and countering separatist activities, including through multilateral military exercises.

China and Russia both seek security and stability in Central Asia and are wary of what they perceive to be potential western “interference.” Chinese officials have voiced support for cooperating with Russia to fight against potential “color revolutions” in neighboring countries, which Beijing worries could lead to instability spilling over into its western regions of Xinjiang and Tibet. From Beijing’s perspective, Russia plays a crucial role in shaping regional security dynamics thanks to its close relationships with former Soviet states in the region. Russia demonstrated its ability to shape the region in January 2022 when it deployed troops to Kazakhstan to quell violent protests that erupted over high energy prices. China and Russia also both see shared interests in working with the Taliban in Afghanistan to reduce the risk of terrorist activity there and throughout the region.

Elsewhere in the region, Beijing has pursued cooperation with Moscow in managing the North Korean nuclear issue. Both countries have pushed back against calls by the United States and its partners to impose additional sanctions on North Korea, and they have recommended lifting certain sanctions. At the same time, Beijing is aware of Pyongyang’s desire to maneuver between its two large neighbors, as it has at times sought to pit Beijing against Moscow. To sustain any major policies toward North Korea, China needs Russian support or to at least ensure that Moscow does not play a spoiler role.

Supporting Xi Jinping’s Priorities

Russia is not unique in being willing to accept or support China’s core interests. Many countries are willing to do so. A key factor that differentiates Russia is high-level political support from Beijing, which stems from the close personal relationship between Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin. Their personal ties help to drive high-level strategic convergence and overcome any distrust or differences at lower levels.

Xi has repeatedly heaped praise on Putin, calling him his “best friend and colleague” and his “bosom buddy.” This has been reflected in Xi’s diplomatic agenda. As of March 2023, Xi has met one-on-one with Putin 41 times—more than twice as many times as he has met with the leader of any other country. Xi has also traveled to Russia nine times since 2013, which is more than double the number of trips he made to any other country.

The personal ties between the two leaders have brought their countries closer across several key areas. Under Putin, Russia has supported virtually all of Xi Jinping’s most important priorities on the world stage. Russia has at least rhetorically supported the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xi’s signature foreign policy aimed at expanding China’s global economic and political influence through heightened economic and physical connectivity. Russian and Chinese leaders have repeatedly voiced joint calls for linking up the BRI with its Russian counterpart, the Eurasian Economic Union; however, progress on synching the two initiatives has been lackluster.

Russia joined the Chinese-sponsored Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, a multilateral bank headquartered in China that provides an alternative to the World Bank and Asian Development Bank. Russia has also supported China’s Global Development Initiative, which Xi proposed amid the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic to focus on issues such as poverty alleviation, food security, Covid-19 response, and other areas. Additionally, Xi Jinping likely saw Putin’s visit to China to attend the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics as a gesture of good will, especially given that most Western leaders chose not to attend or instituted diplomatic boycotts of the games due to concerns about human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

Amplifying China's Global Reach

The third major force driving closer ties is a shared desire by Beijing and Moscow to expand their influence on the world stage at the expense of the United States and its democratic allies. While Russian power is stagnating in crucial areas, many in China see Moscow as being capable of “playing a weak hand well.” Beijing sees significant benefits in Russia’s capacity and willingness to wield its political, economic, military, and discourse power in ways that align with Chinese interests.

China and Russia are both wary of a U.S.-dominated international order that they believe undermines their interests. The two maintain convergent threat assessments that Washington, with support from its allies, seeks to encircle and isolate them militarily while undermining their political systems and promoting “color revolutions.” They view Western economic sanctions, technological decoupling, and other efforts as being aimed at undermining their development.

The two countries have frequently criticized the United States and its partners in their joint statements. Their February 4, 2022, joint statement—which highlighted their closeness on the eve of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—criticized the United States nine times, including complaints about the U.S. Indo-Pacific Strategy, the trilateral AUKUS security partnership, and U.S. developments related to missile deployments, missile defense, and biological and chemical weapons.

In pushing back against Western influence, Beijing benefits from Russia’s ability to shape international developments and leverage its power over countries—especially within the developing world.

On the political front, Russia holds significant positions within international organizations such as the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), where it (like China) enjoys veto power as a permanent member. Through the UNSC, China and Russia have sought to steer international developments in their favor. China and Russia jointly condemned NATO’s use of force in Yugoslavia and the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. In 2020, China and Russia spearheaded a successful campaign within the UNSC to stop U.S.-led efforts to re-impose UN sanctions on Iran in the wake of the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal.

China’s 13 most recent vetoes within the UNSC have all aligned with Russian vetoes. Ten of these have been related to opposing U.S. and allied efforts to address the conflict and humanitarian crisis in Syria. China has also abstained from voting on UNSC resolutions that run counter to Russian interests, including a 2014 resolution declaring invalid a referendum that led to Crimea’s independence and a resolution condemning Russia for its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Beijing and Moscow have specifically sought to cooperate within international organizations to undermine Western norms around democracy and human rights. Since the late 1990s, China and Russia have been involved in the informal Like-Minded Group, a coalition of largely authoritarian countries that have worked together in the United Nations to weaken the international human rights regime and redefine human rights. The two countries have jointly signed over 40 statements in the UN Human Rights Council to endorse alternative views on human rights.²

Beyond the United Nations, China and Russia have worked together in other important multilateral settings to offset Western influence. In 2009, Russia advocated that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) expand the basket of Special Drawing Rights to include the Russian ruble and Chinese yuan as part of reforming the IMF to be more inclusive. The two countries have also advocated for their shared interests within BRICS Summits—annual meetings of the world’s leading developing economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa)—and they continue to call for further cooperation within the BRICS framework.

On the economic front, Russia wields significant leverage over several countries through its provision of energy resources. In 2020, 10 European and Central Asian countries purchased more than 60 percent of their crude oil imports from Russia, with Estonia, Kyrgyzstan, Slovakia, and Kazakhstan buying virtually all of their imported crude oil from Russia. These countries, and others, are also heavily reliant on imports of Russian refined oil, gas, and coal.

Russia has a track record of using its prominence in energy markets to its advantage. In 2014, Russian energy giant Gazprom cut off gas deliveries to Slovakia, Austria, Poland, and Romania to disrupt diversions of oil to Ukraine. The European Union scrambled to find alternative sources of energy, but it was forced to pay a higher price in doing so. Many of these same dynamics played out in Europe amid Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with Russia’s Nord Stream pipeline being a major source of contention. For Beijing, Russia’s ability to use such influence is an important asset for constraining and countering countries on key issues.

Moscow also exerts significant influence in much of the developing world through its military power, especially its weapons sales. Particularly important for Beijing is Russia’s influence over Vietnam and India, both of which have tense relations with China. Since 2010, Vietnam has received some 80 percent of its weapons imports from Russia. India likewise ordered 62 percent of its arms imports from Russia during that period, and today nearly 70 percent of India’s military equipment is Russian-made. Moscow may be able to use its leverage over these two countries to discourage them from aligning closer to the West (and against Russian and Chinese interests).

Russia’s international influence in the military realm does not just stem from arms sales. Moscow holds sway in developing countries through military deployments. Over the last few decades, Russia has amassed a substantial military footprint around the world, including within the Caucuses and Syria, but also further afield in the Central African Republic, Egypt, Libya, Sudan, and even Venezuela. More recently, Russia has sought to expand its influence in the African country of Mali through the deployment of Russian private military contractors.

Finally, China sees benefits in Russia’s ability and willingness to shape global discourse through disinformation and propaganda that converges with China’s own anti-Western messaging. The Russian government has long used online tools to spread pro-Russian, anti-Western narratives. The government-funded organization Russia Today, for example, regularly spreads divisive, anti-Western disinformation to its nearly 7.5 million Facebook followers and 3 million Twitter followers from around the world.

Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia and China have used their state-linked online platforms in complementary efforts to shape global discourse and spread disinformation. Russia, has focused intently on undermining confidence in Western vaccines and flaming internal divisions within Western countries over issues like vaccine mandates. Early on in the pandemic, China marshalled its diplomats and state-linked media to spread propaganda defending China’s response to the pandemic, but over time it focused more heavily on criticizing the West’s handling of Covid-19. Studies suggest the two countries learned from each other in spreading disinformation and that they benefited from shared efforts to undercut the image of the United States and its allies.

Advancing China's Military Power

Military cooperation has been a crucial element of the China-Russia relationship over the years. The two sides have demonstrated a high level of cooperation on military technology—most notably through arms sales—as well as military-to-military cooperation through joint exercises.

Following the 1989 normalization of relations between Beijing and Moscow, Soviet and Russian arms sales to China were critical to China’s push to modernize and equip the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) as Western countries limited their provision of weapons to China. In the 1990s, China spent billions of dollars ordering dozens of Russian Su-27 and Su-30 aircraft and securing the licenses to produce hundreds more of the planes within China. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, China ordered other major systems from Russia, including a dozen Kilo-class diesel-powered submarines, four Sovremenny-class destroyers, and S300 PMU2 anti-aircraft missiles, as well as numerous additional aircraft. Altogether, between 1990 and 2005, China purchased more than 83 percent of its arms imports from Russia.

The years that followed saw a marked decline in Chinese arms purchases—from both Russia and other countries. This stemmed in part from Russian concerns about Chinese copying and IP theft of Russian military technologies as well as the Chinese defense industry’s growing ability to produce more equipment indigenously. China’s arms purchases from 2011 to 2021 fell 46 percent from the 2000-2010 period, and purchases from Russia as a percent of China’s total arms imports slipped to around 67 percent.

Under Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, China and Russia made efforts to arrest this trend and revive arms sales as an important part of the relationship. A series of deals in 2015 saw China purchase some $5 billion worth of Su-35 combat aircraft and S-400 air defense systems. In 2019, President Putin also announced that Russia was helping China to create a missile attack warning system, suggesting a continued high degree of military technological cooperation.

In addition to arms sales, China and Russia have achieved substantial progress on cooperation through joint military exercises. The two countries conducted their first bilateral joint exercise in 2005. Known as “Peace Mission 2005,” the exercise saw 10,000 Chinese and Russian troops take part in land, sea, and air operations in Vladivostok in Russia and on the Shandong peninsula in China. Like many joint China-Russia military exercises that have followed, it was described as being largely aimed at counterterrorism operations; however, the inclusion of major military assets like strategic bombers was seen by many as an indication that it was broader in scope and also intended as a warning to the United States and Taiwan.

The next several years saw the two countries participate in a handful of joint exercises, averaging approximately one to two exercises per year. Starting in 2013, however, China and Russia significantly ramped up their bilateral and multilateral exercises with each other. Through mid-2022, they have held at least 78 military (and paramilitary) exercises.

Want to learn more about China-Russia military ties? Explore this ChinaPower page, which features a unique dataset on China-Russia joint military exercises and more.

Explore More.

These military exercises have not only grown in number but also in complexity. In October 2021, China and Russia completed joint naval drills in the Sea of Japan, followed immediately by their first joint naval patrol in the western Pacific. The joint naval patrol consisted of 10 Chinese and Russian warships as well as six carrier-based helicopters and featured joint maneuvers and live-fire drills.

These frequent exercises present several benefits for China. Earlier on, they provided an opportunity for the PLA to learn from the more experienced and technologically advanced Russian military. In more recent exercises, Chinese defense experts have noted that the PLA now plays an equal or more senior role in planning and operations. The exercises also serve as an important means of institutionalizing bilateral military ties, promoting interoperability and confidence building, and sending deterrent signals to third parties such as the United States.  

Economic and Resource Complementarity

Finally, China’s ties with Russia generate notable benefits on the economic front. The last two decades have witnessed enormous growth in trade between the two countries. Between 2000 and 2021, China’s annual trade with Russia grew more than 18-fold, from just $8 billion to more than $147 billion.

While this only represents about 2 percent of China’s total trade with the world, it is the content of the trade relationship—not the size—that is crucial to China. Major energy products, such as oil, coal, and gas, comprise approximately two-thirds of China’s imports from Russia. Crude oil alone accounts for over half of China’s imports from Russia. In 2021, China imported some $40.5 billion worth of Russian crude oil—roughly 16 percent of its total oil imports—making Russia its second largest oil supplier after Saudi Arabia.

Russian trade with China also has a disproportionate impact on certain local economies within China. Trade with Russia is particularly important among northeastern provinces that border Russia. According to Chinese customs data, 24 percent of exports out of China’s Heilongjiang Province went to Russia in 2021, and a massive 78 percent of the province’s imports came from Russia. Jilin and Inner Mongolia—both of which border Russia—are likewise more dependent on Russian trade than other provinces (though to a lesser extent than Heilongjiang).

From Beijing’s perspective, Russia plays a crucial role in promoting economic growth in a lagging region. Both Jilin and Heilongjiang form part of China’s northeastern “rust belt,” an area of the country that has struggled to overcome the impacts of de-industrialization. China has sought to maximize the benefits of Russian trade to the region by forming pilot free trade zones in Heilongjiang and enabling Jilin export access to a Russian port. Additionally, two land ports within Hunchun, a city in Jilin, were approved as official seafood import ports from Russia, allowing Russian seafood exports to directly reach Hunchun, lowering costs and improving quality.

The post What Are the Key Strengths of the China-Russia Relationship? appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

Backgrounder: How Has the China-Russia Relationship Evolved?

This backgrounder explores the history of China-Russia relations, from the establishment of relations between the People’s Republic of China and the Soviet Union to the present. The backgrounder features an interactive timeline of major milestones in the bilateral relationship, which you can preview below.

Major Milestones in the China-Russia Relationship

Feature 1: What Are the Key Strengths of the China-Russia Relationship?

This feature explores how the China-Russia relationship came to be so close, up until the time of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The analysis centers on five key ways in which China benefits from the relationship, each of which is examined in detail.

One of the key strengths highlighted in this feature is the strong personal relationship between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Since he became China’s president in 2013, Xi has met with Vladimir Putin over 40 times—more than double the number of times Xi has met with leaders of any other major power.

Feature 2: What Are the Weaknesses of the China-Russia Relationship?

This feature explores key areas of uncertainty and weak points within the China-Russia relationship. While ties between Beijing and Moscow are currently close, there are areas of tension and uncertainty within the relationship. One potential long-term stressor on the relationship is the growing power disparity between the two countries, as China solidifies its position as the more "senior" partner.

This is most visible with respect to economic power. China's GDP has already far outpaced Russia's, and the gap between the two is set to widen as China's GDP is expected to climb toward nearly $30 trillion in the coming years, while Russia's is forecasted to stagnate at well under $2 trillion.

Feature 3: How Deep Are China-Russia Military Ties?

The final feature in the series analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of China-Russia military relations, focusing on arms sales and joint military exercises.

Arms sales have ebbed and flowed over the years, with a notable decrease in recent years. Joint exercises, however, remain a critical element of military ties between the two countries. Altogether, China and Russia participated in at least 78 joint military exercises between 2003 and mid-2022, with more than half of these taking place since 2016.

The post Series: China-Russia Relations appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

Proposition 1

The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the timeline by which China will surpass the United States to become the world’s leading economic power. 

Friday, November 19, 2021, 9:00 am – 10:15 am ET

FOR: Dr. Yao Yang
Professor, China Center for Economic Research and the National School of Development
Peking University

AGAINST: Mr. Gerard DiPippo
Senior Fellow, Economics Program
Center for Strategic and International Studies

Watch the event here.

Keynote Remarks

Keynote Remarks by the Hon. Christine Wormuth, Secretary of the U.S. Army

Wednesday, December 1, 2021, 9:30 am – 10:15 am ET

Watch the event here.

Proposition 2

Beijing’s crackdown on tech firms will significantly stifle Chinese technological and scientific innovation.

Monday, December 6, 2021, 4:00 pm – 5:15 pm ET

FOR: Mr. Matt Sheehan
Fellow, Asia Program
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

AGAINST: Ms. Rui Ma
China Tech Analyst; Main Writer and Co-Host
Tech Buzz China

Watch the event here.

Proposition 3 and Keynote Remarks

Within the next two years, China will establish itself as the most influential external power within Afghanistan. 

Tuesday, December 14, 2021, 8:45 am – 10:00 am ET

FOR: Sr. Col. Zhou Bo
Senior Fellow, Center of Strategy and Security
Tsinghua University

AGAINST: Dr. Seth Jones
Senior Vice President; Harold Brown Chair; and Director, International Security Program
Center for Strategic and International Studies

Keynote Remarks by U.S. Senator Steve Daines (R-Montana), Commissioner, Congressional-Executive Commission on China; Co-Chair, Senate U.S.-China Working Group

Tuesday, December 14, 2021, 10:15 am – 10:45 am

Watch the event here.

Proposition 4

Given China’s growing power, China will have a sphere of influence in the Indo-Pacific by 2027. 

Friday, December 17, 2021, 1:00 pm – 2:15 pm ET

FOR: Dr. Graham Allison
Douglas Dillon Professor of Government
Harvard University

AGAINST: Hon. David Stilwell
Former Assistant Secretary of State, East Asian and Pacific Affairs, US Department of State

Watch the event here.

The post China’s Power: Up for Debate 2021 appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

To date, Chinese social media campaigns have consisted of two major components. Throughout the pandemic—most frequently in early 2020—Chinese state-linked accounts on Twitter focused on defending and praising China’s handling of the pandemic and criticizing other countries’ responses to the pandemic. Faced with renewed scrutiny over the origins of the coronavirus in 2021, Chinese state-linked accounts turned to deflecting criticisms that China is to blame for the pandemic­, especially accusations that the coronavirus originated in a Chinese research lab.

Assessing the efficacy of Chinese disinformation and propaganda campaigns is difficult, but available evidence suggests these efforts have had limited impacts. Perceptions about China’s handling of the pandemic have improved with time, but Beijing has not shaken accusations that it is ultimately to blame for the pandemic, and unfavorable views of China remain near record highs in many countries.

China’s Initial Response to Covid-19 Sparked Criticism

The Chinese government’s approach to the initial outbreak of Covid-19 in Wuhan was hampered by a desire to control information and prevent public panic. Beijing’s reticence resulted in mistakes and bureaucratic inefficiencies that ultimately allowed the virus to spread more rapidly throughout the world. These failures severely damaged China’s international image and set the tone for how Beijing would use social media to try to re-shape global narratives about the pandemic.

Public opinion polling indicates widespread negative views on China’s handling of the pandemic. A YouGov-Cambridge poll conducted in July and August of 2020 found that large majorities of respondents in two-dozen countries believed that Beijing had “tried to hide the truth” about its initial outbreak. A similar share of respondents believed that Chinese authorities could have prevented the spread of Covid-19 internationally if they had responded faster. These views were not only common in developed countries—where negative views of China tend to be highest—but also in the developing countries surveyed.

Concerns about China’s handling of the pandemic contributed to plummeting overall perceptions of China. In a 2020 Pew Research Center poll of 14 developed economies, a majority of respondents in each country had unfavorable views toward China. In nine of those—Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States—unfavorability toward China reached record-breaking levels within Pew polls.

Negative views of China’s handling of the pandemic were driven in large part by perceptions that Chinese officials were not transparent and slow in responding to the outbreak in Wuhan. Experts at the World Health Organization (WHO) learned of the outbreak through Chinese social media reporting and repeatedly requested more information and access, only to be provided with the bare information required from China.

Despite completing a full genetic sequencing of the virus, SARS-CoV-2, by January 3, Chinese government scientists did not publicly declare that the virus is capable of human-to-human transmission until January 20. The Chinese government also punished medical professionals who attempted to publicly warn others about the virus—most notably Dr. Li Wenliang, who died of Covid-19 after having been detained by Chinese security authorities.

Beijing eventually took steps to control the spread of the virus by locking down Wuhan and other cities in Hubei province on January 23, 2020. By then the virus had spread well beyond China’s borders, including to Thailand, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. It took China another week to share more information with the WHO, and officials only did so after WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made an extraordinary trip to Beijing to meet President Xi Jinping and request more details about the virus. Immediately after this meeting, the WHO declared an international health emergency, prompting countries like the United States to impose limits on travel from China.

In addition to concerns about China’s mishandling of the outbreak, there is evidence that the Chinese government has not been transparent about the number of Covid-19 cases and deaths within China. Through mid-October 2021, Chinese authorities recorded about 8 cases and 0.35 deaths per 100,000, while the United States had reported about 13,500 cases and nearly 217 deaths per 100,000. However, Chinese authorities publicly disclosed far fewer cases of confirmed and suspected patients than documented in internal reports, and the official tally of cases and deaths likely deeply undercounts the actual impact of the virus within China.

A study by China’s own Centers for Disease Control suggested that the actual number of cases in Wuhan may have been 10 times higher than officially reported. A study of how the virus spread through international air traffic found that actual cases in China may have been as much as 37 times higher than what was reported in January 2020. The death toll from the pandemic was likely also higher than reported. According to one estimate, the death toll in Wuhan may have varied 2-3 times higher than officially reported.

Beijing’s Use of Social Media to Shape Narratives Abroad

Faced with criticism over its handling of the pandemic, the Chinese government and its proxies have leveraged social media—especially Twitter—to spread its narratives and propaganda abroad. According to a study by researchers at Oxford University, the number of Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) diplomats on Twitter nearly quintupled, from 39 to more than 188, between January 2019 and December 2020. The number of Chinese state-linked media accounts on Twitter also grew from 58 to 76 accounts over the same period. China’s presence increased on Facebook as well, but to a lesser extent. As of March 2021, there were 84 Chinese MFA diplomats and officials and 95 state-linked media accounts identified on Facebook.

These accounts used their digital megaphones to push Beijing’s narratives around the world. Using data provided by the Alliance for Securing Democracy, ChinaPower’s analysis reveals that Chinese state-linked accounts tweeted about Covid-19 more than 270,000 times between January 2020 and September 2021.¹ Chinese Twitter activity peaked at roughly 29,400 tweets in April 2020 as China reined in its outbreak at home. In subsequent months, Chinese accounts have averaged about 11,000 tweets per month.

Defending China, Criticizing Others

Much of China’s initial efforts focused on defending China’s response to the pandemic. State-linked accounts emphasized China’s success in containing the virus by praising domestic efforts to combat the virus, from rapidly building new makeshift hospitals to sharing heartwarming photos of frontline health professionals working long hours to treat patients. The most popular Chinese pandemic-related tweet in January 2020 was a retweet of Donald Trump’s post praising China for working “very hard” to contain the virus.

According to content analysis by ChinaPower of the top 20 Covid-related tweets from each month, Chinese state-linked accounts shifted their approach as the pandemic wore on.² As China battled its outbreak at home from January to March 2020, nearly 47 percent of tweets were aimed at praising or defending China’s approach. However, as China gained control over its outbreak and as the severity of the pandemic increased worldwide, these Twitter accounts turned to criticizing other countries. From April to June 2020, 50 percent of the top tweets focused on criticizing or highlighting the failings of other countries, while only 18 percent focused on defending or praising China.

This shift has persisted. Through September 2021, about 43 percent of the top pandemic-related tweets promoted by Chinese-linked accounts were aimed at criticizing other countries. Another 20 percent of all top tweets were aimed at defending or praising China, and 12 percent were praising other countries for their handling of the pandemic. The other 24 percent did not fit within any specific category.

Chinese state-linked Twitter accounts aimed much of their attacks against the United States. Through September 2021, the United States was mentioned in roughly 23,400 tweets about Covid-19—more than four times the next most-mentioned country, the United Kingdom.

Many of these were retweets of U.S. politicians and journalists criticizing and covering the Trump administration’s handling of the pandemic. As the 2020 U.S. presidential election grew closer and criticism of the Trump administration increased online, Chinese accounts exploited political divisiveness to ramp up criticism of the United States’ handling of the pandemic. In October 2020, one month before the election, 14 of the 20 top tweets were targeted at criticizing the United States. The most popular tweet that month was MFA Spokesperson Zhao Lijian’s retweet of President Donald Trump announcing that he and First Lady Melania Trump had contracted Covid-19. The third most popular tweet was a retweet by China Daily EU Bureau Chief Chen Weihua of Senator Bernie Sanders criticizing Trump.

Through these efforts, Beijing sought to promote a common narrative that its successes were thanks to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and China’s governance model while framing U.S. failures as shortcomings of democracies. Early in the pandemic, the CCP-run newspaper Global Times published an article arguing that the United States needs to “learn from China” in fighting Covid-19. In March 2021, the Chinese State Council issued a report which stated that the U.S. government’s “incompetent pandemic response…. added to the human rights violations in the country, the so-called ‘city upon a hill’ and ‘beacon of democracy.’” The report added that the pandemic in the United States was “accompanied by political disorder, inter-ethnic conflicts, and social division.”

Besides the United States, China conducted significant propaganda and disinformation campaigns against Europe. The United Kingdom, Italy, and France all ranked among the top seven most-mentioned countries, and together they were mentioned in more than 10,000 pandemic-related tweets. Not all tweets were critical of European countries: one top 20 retweet in April praised Chancellor Angela Merkel for Germany’s handling of the pandemic. However, Chinese accounts regularly shared perceived criticisms of European countries. A top 20 tweet in February 2021 was a retweet by Chen Weihua about a court ruling in the Netherlands ordering government-imposed coronavirus curfews to be lifted.

In early 2021, Chinese media also spread claims that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are risky and even deadly, highlighting extremely rare sudden deaths or illnesses from people who received the vaccine in France, Germany, Mexico, Norway and Portugal. George Gao Fu, the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention stated in a press conference that mRNA vaccines developed in the United States and Britain are not without risks and should be utilized with caution.

Taiwan was another major target of Chinese Covid-19 disinformation tactics—an unsurprising development given Beijing’s persistent use of disinformation against the island. China repeatedly sought to cast doubt on Taipei’s success at curtailing the spread of the virus. In 2020, The Investigation Bureau of Taiwan reported a significant increase in the dissemination of misinformation on social media about Taiwan’s Covid-19 responses originating from mainland China. In May 2021, Taiwan Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Wang Ting-Yu initiated an investigation into a widescale disinformation campaign targeting Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Center. Wang stated that the spread of false information—such as fabricated Covid-19 death data, claims of hospitals dumping bodies of Covid-19 victims into rivers, and funeral parlors burning bodies of patients—were indicative of a well-coordinated “cognitive-warfare” campaign by mainland China.

Deflecting Blame for the Pandemic

In addition to criticizing and spreading disinformation about other countries’ handling of the pandemic, Chinese media outlets and diplomats amplified unfounded conspiracy theories that SARS-CoV-2 originated outside of China. Chinese government proxies have suggested a handful of potential origins of the virus. Chinese state media, for example, distorted an Italian doctor’s statements to suggest that Covid-19 originated in Italy in November 2019.

More frequently, China has accused the United States of causing the pandemic. One narrative pushed by Chinese media and officials holds that the U.S. military spread the virus at an international sports competition held in Wuhan in 2019. Chinese officials and state media have specifically suggested without evidence that the virus may have been created at Fort Detrick, a U.S. military biological laboratory in Maryland.

Chinese diplomats and state-backed media drastically ramped up tweets about Fort Detrick in mid-2021 in the wake of President Joe Biden’s announcement that he had directed the U.S. intelligence community to conduct a 90-day investigation of the origins of the virus. From May to August 2021, the combined number of tweets by these accounts mentioning Fort Detrick jumped nearly ninefold from 47 to 402, before tapering off significantly in September.³

Impacts on Global Perceptions of China

So far, there is no clear evidence that Chinese disinformation and propaganda campaigns have produced significant results. China’s image has recovered somewhat with regards to its handling of the pandemic, but China’s overall unfavorability remains historically high, and perceptions that China is to blame for the pandemic persist.

Public opinion polling indicates significant improvements in perceptions of China’s handling of the pandemic around the world. Among a dozen countries polled by Pew Research Center in 2020 and 2021, there was a median increase of 11 percentage points (from 39 to 50) in the share of respondents saying that China has done a good job dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic. Favorable views of China’s Covid-19 handling saw the greatest gains in Europe, where China was seen as performing well relative to Europe itself and the United States. In South Korea and Japan, where the prevalence of Covid-19 was much lower, views of China’s handling of the pandemic remained more negative.

Despite growing perceptions that China has handled the pandemic well, there have not been sizable improvements in China’s overall image. In a dozen wealthy countries, a median of 72.5 percent of people had unfavorable views of China in 2021—virtually unchanged from 2020 (median of 73 percent). This represents a significant increase from 2019, when those same countries had a median of 58.5 percent unfavorable views of China.  

Concerns about the origins of Covid-19 continue to dog China diplomatically. Beijing has repeatedly sought to deter WHO investigations into the origins of the coronavirus amid pressure from the United States and Australia. However, Beijing’s obfuscation and attempts to sow uncertainty about the virus may have backfired: on October 13, 2021, the WHO announced the establishment of a scientific advisory group that will study the virus’ origin and how to better prepare for future outbreaks of new pathogens. On the day of the announcement, WHO Director-General Tedros wrote that “laboratory hypotheses must be examined carefully, with a focus on labs in the location where the first reports of human infections emerged in Wuhan.”

The efficacy of Chinese disinformation and propaganda campaigns may ultimately be limited by the simple fact that people already holding negative views of China are unlikely to be receptive to Chinese narratives. For example, one study concluded that competing U.S. and Chinese narratives were outweighed by “master narratives” about the world that existed prior to the pandemic. The study found that key states, including Australia, India, South Korea, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, largely ignored U.S. and Chinese narratives about the pandemic, or hedged to avoid choosing one side over the other.

In addition to using disinformation and propaganda to shore up China's international image, Beijing has also engaged in sweeping efforts to supply the world with medical aid and Covid-19 vaccines. Learn more about China’s Covid-19 diplomacy.

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Taken together, this evidence suggests China’s disinformation and propaganda campaigns have not had a sizable impact. Shaping global narratives is difficult, and even in countries where publics increasingly believe China has handled the pandemic well, Beijing’s combativeness and lack of transparency have engendered persistent negative views of China.

The post Is China Succeeding at Shaping Global Narratives about Covid-19? appeared first on ChinaPower Project.

The global impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic have offered China an unprecedented opportunity to shore up its international image and influence by providing the world with medical aid and vaccines. Based on analysis of Chinese activities from 2020 to present, ChinaPower has identified six main features of Beijing’s “Covid-19 diplomacy”:

1. China’s Covid-19 diplomacy is not primarily based on need or reciprocity. Political and strategic calculations—including the desire to strengthen existing relationships and forge new ones—figure prominently in Beijing’s decisions to provide medical aid or vaccines. As a result, Chinese activities have likely improved Beijing’s image and helped strengthen its relationships with countries that sought, or already enjoyed, strong relationships with China.
2. China’s provision of medical aid and vaccines has frequently come with “strings attached.” This includes Chinese requests that countries show gratitude towards Beijing and support Chinese foreign policy goals. This heavy-handed and abrasive approach has led to more criticism and growing distrust of China among many countries, especially wealthy democratic countries.
3. The overwhelming majority of China’s public health diplomacy has come in the form of commercial sales rather than donations. This stands in contrast to Beijing’s efforts to project the impression that most Chinese medical supplies and vaccines have been donated.
4. While the United States and many other wealthy countries have donated large quantities of vaccines to COVAX (a global initiative to promote equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines), China predominantly engages countries bilaterally to augment its bilateral influence. Only a small proportion of Chinese vaccine exports have been allocated to COVAX or other multilateral mechanisms.
5. Beijing has prioritized speed over quality in order to secure first-mover advantages. Concerns about the quality of Chinese medical supplies and vaccines have undercut China’s Covid-19 diplomacy.
6. China’s Covid-19 diplomacy has been accompanied by aggressive Chinese information and disinformation campaigns—a topic that will be covered in-depth in the next ChinaPower feature.

To holistically assess the scope and impact of China’s activities during the Covid-19 pandemic, ChinaPower collected thousands of data points to construct the Chinese Covid-19 Diplomacy Index (CCDI). The CCDI scores each country based on their performance within two sub-indices: the Medical Diplomacy Index and the Vaccine Diplomacy Index. Each sub-index is composed of two main pillars: Engagement and Response. The Engagement pillar assesses whether, and to what extent, China engaged a given country in terms of supplying either medical aid or vaccines. The Response pillar assesses whether, and to what extent, a recipient country’s government responded to Chinese engagement. Higher CCDI scores indicate greater Chinese influence through Covid-19 diplomacy.

The CCDI includes scores for 138 countries based on data available through mid-September 2021.¹ The findings of the CCDI are preliminary since the pandemic is still ongoing and more data will become available over time, but it nevertheless provides unique insights into China’s Covid-19 diplomacy. At present, the CCDI shows a clear pattern: China’s activities have had the greatest impact in middle income countries along China’s periphery, as well as in Sub-Saharan Africa and Eastern Europe.

The world’s largest economies (those in the G20) tend to score low in the CCDI, with the wealthiest countries such as the United States and most Western European countries earning particularly low scores. Only two high-income countries—Chile and Hungary—rank among the top ten within the CCDI. Conversely, countries with strong existing relationships with China tend to score higher. As one indicator of this, countries that have signaled their endorsement of China’s “Health Silk Road” (HSR) concept scored much higher. These trends indicate that China’s Covid-19 diplomacy was most significant in countries where China already had strong diplomatic relations and sizable influence before the start of the pandemic.

In addition to the topline findings of the CCDI, our survey of Chinese activities generated several important initial findings about China’s approach to medical diplomacy and vaccine diplomacy. These findings are discussed in detail in the sections that follow, but a summary of key insights is listed below.

Medical Diplomacy

1. In 2020, about 43 percent of global imports of personal protective equipment (PPE) came from China—up from 21 percent in 2019.
2. Over 99 percent of PPE imports from China came in the form of sales rather than donations.
3. In at least 86 countries, government officials of varying seniority participated in handover ceremonies to show gratitude for deliveries of Chinese medical supplies.
4. China provided pandemic-related medical assistance to at least 63 countries, either by sending in-person medical teams or providing virtual training sessions to local experts.
5. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) delivered medical aid (including supplies and medical teams) to at least 52 countries.
6. China hosted high-level special meetings on COVID-19 and issued joint statements related to medical aid and cooperation within eight different regional multilateral settings.

Vaccine Diplomacy

1. As of September 7, 2021, China has finalized agreements to export 1.1 billion doses of vaccines. About 96 percent of Chinese vaccines were sold rather than donated, and 84 percent of Chinese vaccines were provided bilaterally, rather than through multilateral groupings such as COVAX.
2. Most Chinese vaccines have gone to middle-income countries, rather than low-income countries.
3. In 84 countries, government officials of varying seniority participated in handover ceremonies to show gratitude for deliveries of Chinese vaccines.
4. Since June 2020, 27 countries have hosted trials of Chinese vaccines.
5. At least 14 countries have signed agreements with China to locally produce Chinese vaccines.
6. Heads of state or government in 26 countries have publicly received jabs of Chinese vaccines.
7. Health authorities in at least 10 countries have suspended the use of Chinese vaccines, recommended pairing them with non-Chinese booster shots, or pushed back on them in some other way due to safety and efficacy concerns.

China’s Medical Diplomacy

As it gained control over the spread of Covid-19 at home, China quickly sought to take advantage of the pandemic to promote its influence abroad. In May 2020, President Xi Jinping delivered a triumphalist speech at the World Health Assembly in which he declared that China had “turned the tide on the virus” and was prepared to use its resources to help other countries do the same. By the time Xi gave that speech, China was already undertaking sweeping efforts to dispatch medical supplies and teams of medical aides around the world.

To gauge the impacts of Chinese medical aid activities, we constructed the Chinese Medical Diplomacy Index. The index captures the extent of China’s engagement and recipient countries’ responsiveness by assigning scores based on eight key indicators.

The results of the Medical Diplomacy Index indicate that the impacts of China’s activities were geographically far-reaching. Countries from Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern and Central Europe, and East Asia and the Pacific figure prominently in the top 10 within the index. Only two countries in the top ten—Hungary and the Czech Republic—are high-income countries; the other eight are middle-income countries.

Beijing may have successfully bolstered its influence in the countries boasting high scores in the index, but it is unclear how lasting the impacts will be; any boost China achieves may only be temporary. The top ten countries in the index already had substantial or strong relationships with China prior to the pandemic, indicating that China’s provision of medical aid likely did not allow Beijing to make major inroads in countries where it did not already have a significant amount of influence. In several countries—especially wealthy democratic ones—Beijing’s desire for public displays of gratitude were either ignored or provoked a backlash that diminished China’s image. As one indicator of this, neither the United States nor any western European country (other than Spain) sent government officials to welcome deliveries of Chinese medical supplies.

Assessing the Scope of China’s Medical Diplomacy

Providing countries with medical supplies has been one of the most high-profile elements of China’s Covid-19 diplomacy. Prior to the pandemic, China was already the world’s top supplier of personal protective equipment (PPE) such as face masks, respirators, face shields, gloves, soap, and cleaning supplies. In 2019, Chinese companies exported some $25.4 billion worth of PPE, well ahead of the next-biggest global suppliers, including Germany ($17.3 billion), the United States ($13.9 billion), Japan ($6.5 billion), and France ($6.3 billion).³

Amid China’s Covid-19 outbreak in January and February 2020, Chinese companies dramatically ramped up production of various medical goods, especially PPE. According to the Chinese government’s National Development and Reform Commission, national capacity for face mask production surged fivefold during February, from 20 million units per day to 110 million per day. After China’s own outbreak was largely contained, Chinese companies began to flood global markets with exports of PPE. During 2020, China’s total PPE exports surged more than three-fold over the previous year to $78.3 billion. The other top global producers of PPE did not see similar increases in exports. 

As the pandemic spread to other parts of the world, many countries became increasingly reliant on China for PPE. In 2019, China supplied 21.1 percent of global imports of PPE, but in 2020 that figure doubled to 42.9 percent.⁴ Wealthy countries were the largest purchasers of Chinese PPE. The United States, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom together took in half of all Chinese PPE exports in 2020. However, China saw its greatest gains in Sub-Saharan Africa, where the share of imports coming from China rose from 17 percent in 2019 to 45 percent in 2020. South Africa, for example, relied on China for 55.6 percent of its 2020 imports of PPE, compared to just 18.3 percent in 2019.

In addition to providing medical supplies, China also dispatched teams of medical professionals and advisors to assist at least 63 countries in handling the pandemic. All but four of these were developing countries (including low-, lower middle-, or upper middle-income), and 27 of them were in Sub-Saharan Africa. In some cases, China already had medical teams embedded in countries, and they were directed to assist in helping with combatting Covid-19. This was particularly common in Africa, where Chinese medical teams have been active for decades. Chinese medial teams also conducted virtual Covid-19 prevention trainings. In March 2020, for example, Chinese government officials and medical experts held a virtual information-sharing conference with officials and medical specialists from 10 Pacific Island countries.

The Chinese military played a distinct role in supporting China’s medical diplomacy. As of September 2021, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) had delivered medical supplies and aid to at least 52 countries. This was typically done in the form of military-to-military aid, but the PLA also supplied medical aid for broader consumption. Many of the countries that received medical supplies and aid from the PLA were both geographically and diplomatically close to China. In April 2020, for instance, the PLA delivered medical supplies and teams of military medics to Myanmar, Pakistan, and Laos. Official Chinese media coverage noted that the aid “shows the high-level of mutual trust and friendly relations between China and these countries.”

As it engaged in medical aid diplomacy, Beijing sought to leverage existing regional multilateral mechanisms to enhance its approach. In addition to regular engagement through global organizations like the United Nations and World Health Organization (WHO), China promoted targeted cooperation on medical aid in at least nine regional and multilateral settings, including:

• A conference on Belt and Road international cooperation
• A grouping of South Asian countries including Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka
• A vice-ministerial conference with Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka
• A special vice-ministerial meeting with Caribbean countries
• A special vice-ministerial meeting with Pacific Island countries
• The ASEAN Plus Three summit
• The G-20 Leaders’ Summit and G-20 Sherpa Meeting
• The Shanghai Cooperation Organization

A key element of China’s multilateral engagement has been promoting the development of a “Health Silk Road” (HSR), which Beijing has elevated during the pandemic as a means of promoting the broader Belt and Road Initiative. In June 2020, a group of 25 countries signed onto a joint communique that explicitly promoted the HSR concept and called for sharing experiences and information and boosting connectivity to facilitate the flow of Covid-19 prevention supplies and other public health goods. Notably, these 25 countries tended to score highly in the medical diplomacy index: six of the top ten signed onto the communique.

The Mixed Results of China’s Medical Diplomacy

While China’s medical diplomacy was sweeping in scale, it achieved only mixed results. Beijing went to painstaking efforts to cast itself as a benevolent supplier of global public health goods, but its heavy-handed approach often backfired.

In the early days of the pandemic, China’s reputation in some countries was tarnished by accusations that it hoarded medical supplies. As China drastically increased imports of critical medical goods to address its domestic Covid-19 outbreak, it soaked up supplies of those goods globally, leading to skyrocketing prices on the world market. Many countries were left scrambling to purchase medical goods from China, which often resulted in bidding wars. In Australia, these dynamics led to heated public criticism that China “drained” Australia of medical supplies when the country needed it to combat the coronavirus. In Mexico, some noted that the medical supplies they received from China were those they had previously sold to Beijing, but now had to purchase back at a higher cost.

To combat this narrative and elevate China’s image, Beijing frequently sought to extract public expressions of gratitude from officials in countries where it sent medical supplies. At the encouragement of China, many recipient countries issued public statements acknowledging Chinese medical aid contributions. Italian foreign minister Luigi di Maio, for example, praised Chinese aid on social media, and Polish Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz released a statement thanking China for its aid.

Where possible, Chinese embassies abroad requested that officials in recipient countries participate in handover ceremonies to showcase Chinese generosity. Many countries obliged. Through September 2021, at least 62 countries held such ceremonies, with more than half of these attended by officials from recipient countries at the rank of minister or cabinet level, or higher.⁵ In Eastern and Central Europe, these public events involved top leaders from countries that had strong and growing relationships with Beijing: Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and Czech Republic Prime Minister Andrej Babiš all welcomed and praised Chinese medical supplies in person at the airport.

While some embraced these activities in order to strengthen relations with Beijing, others such as Poland felt pressured to do so as a quid pro quo for receiving Chinese medical supplies. They viewed Beijing’s requests to show gratitude as China taking advantage of the pandemic to bully countries reliant on China. Many countries, such as India and South Korea, did not engage in such public activities and others, such as Vietnam, only provided a token gesture by sending low-level officials.

China’s heavy-handed approach was in stark contrast to the approach of other major countries. Many countries, especially in Western Europe, quietly donated medical supplies to China during the height of its outbreak. Officials in these countries expressed annoyance with Beijing’s attempts to nurture the perception that it was donating much of its medical supplies, rather than selling them. In reality, over 99 percent of China’s PPE exports were in the form of commercial sales, not donations.

Several countries also complained that China did not reciprocate the large amounts of PPE donations that they provided to China. Data from China’s General Administration of Customs shows that in 2020 China exported $212 million worth of PPE donations and imported nearly $160 million worth of donated PPE. While China was overall a net exporter of PPE donations, several countries donated significantly more to China than they received in return. South Korea was the largest net donor to China, sending $22 million in PPE to China and only receiving $5.9 million in return. The United States, the Philippines, Germany, and Japan were also major net donors, sending China more than $5 million worth of PPE than they received from China. Even several smaller, less-developed countries such as Honduras, Guatemala, and Tunisia were net donors to China.

The soft power gains that Beijing reaped from providing medical supplies were sometimes watered down by concerns about quality. Many of the products that China exported—from face masks to medical test kits—were defective. A few Chinese companies also took advantage of the pandemic to sell fake or sub-par quality goods. These sales substantially damaged China’s reputation abroad. Criticism of faulty Chinese medical goods were most prominent among developed countries. Of the 34 European countries examined, over two-thirds had commented on quality issues associated with Chinese medical goods. In contrast, only a handful of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa publicly commented on the quality of Chinese medical supplies.

These dynamics indicate that China’s approach led to notable diplomatic and soft power gains in some countries, and limited success in other countries. In many developed democratic countries, Beijing’s heavy-handedness likely worsened its image.

China’s Vaccine Diplomacy

In addition to providing medical aid, China joined several other countries in marshalling its economic and technological resources to develop Covid-19 vaccines. As mass vaccination has emerged as the linchpin of a global recovery from the pandemic, the provision of vaccines has become a major potential source of soft power and diplomatic leverage—and China has positioned itself as one of the world’s top suppliers of vaccines.

Our Chinese Vaccine Diplomacy Index provides a unique and comprehensive assessment of the scope of China’s provision of vaccines, as well as how countries responded to Chinese efforts. Index scores for each country are determined by nine indicators.

Taken together, the index reveals a far more detailed picture of China’s vaccine diplomacy to date than simply counting where China has distributed vaccines. For instance, while only seven percent of Chinese vaccines have gone to high-income countries, three high-income countries (Chile, Hungary, and Trinidad and Tobago) rank among the top ten in the index. This is largely because these countries had greater financial resources to purchase large quantities of Chinese vaccines, and because their governments were highly receptive to Chinese engagement. At the same time, four middle-income countries in Sub-Saharan Africa also rank among the top 10 in the index, largely because they are highly reliant on Chinese vaccines for all—or virtually all—of their vaccine supply. 

China’s vaccine diplomacy may have generated goodwill in the top-scoring countries in the index, but beyond those, it is not clear that China’s provision of vaccines has significantly strengthened Beijing’s diplomatic influence. About 96 percent of the vaccines that China has provided to the world were purchased rather than donated. Similarly, China has delivered the vast majority of its vaccines bilaterally, rather than through multilateral mechanisms like COVAX. As a result, poor countries have largely lacked the resources to purchase Chinese vaccines, and to date they have only received small donations relative to the size of their populations.

Chinese vaccines also face tough competition from vaccines developed in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere. Concerns that Chinese vaccines are less safe and effective than their American and European counterparts have diminished their attractiveness. Many of the middle-income countries that have the resources to purchase vaccines have scrambled to acquire whatever they can get, meaning that their use of Chinese vaccines may reflect their desperation to inoculate their populations rather than a desire to enhance relations with Beijing. Meanwhile, few high-income countries have sought Chinese vaccines and instead have purchased American and European vaccines.

China’s Multi-Faceted Vaccine Diplomacy

Vaccine diplomacy is not simply about exporting doses of vaccines abroad. China took advantage of the multi-faceted vaccine development process to promote its vaccines abroad at multiple different junctures.

Beijing scored important diplomatic wins early in the pandemic by trialing its vaccines abroad. The first overseas trial of Chinese vaccines began in June 2020 when Clover Biopharmaceuticals initiated a small phase I trial of its SCB-2019 vaccine in Australia. The following month, stage III trials of both Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines kicked off in five countries (Bahrain, Brazil, Egypt, Jordan, and the UAE). The Chinese government widely touted overseas trials as a symbol of China’s largesse and a means of improving bilateral relations. In Pakistan, for example, Chinese state media heavily publicized a phase III trial of China’s CanSino vaccine in which 17,500 Pakistanis participated. Media coverage of the trials highlighted the close China-Pakistan relationship and quoted locals as “urgently awaiting” the vaccine amid a wave of Covid-19 cases and deaths.

Many of the countries trialing Chinese vaccines did so with the expectation of gaining priority access once the vaccines were ready for use. As of September 2021, 27 countries have participated in trials of eight different Chinese-developed vaccines. Two-thirds of these countries were middle-income countries, while the other third consisted of high-income countries. These countries that have trialed Chinese vaccines gained points in the Response pillar within the Vaccine Diplomacy Index. However, it is important to note that some additional countries, such as Cambodia, may have desired to host trials of Chinese vaccines, but were ineligible due to limited spread of the virus within their countries during trial periods.

As Chinese vaccine candidates progressed through stages of development, some countries took the additional step of signing agreements with China to jointly produce Chinese vaccines within their countries. As of September 2021, 14 countries have done so, including Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan, Serbia, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates. These countries saw increases in their response scores within the Vaccine Diplomacy index, but as with trialing vaccines, it is important to note that not all countries have the resources to produce vaccines domestically.

China achieved a major milestone in May 2021 when the WHO approved China’s Sinopharm vaccine for emergency use. It marked the first time that any Chinese-developed vaccine has received emergency authorization from the WHO and was widely seen as a symbol of China’s growing technological prowess, as well an indication of the world’s desperate need for vaccines. The WHO followed up in June 2021 by also approving Sinovac’s vaccine for emergency use.

With multiple vaccines approved for use, Beijing intensified its efforts to supply the world with Chinese-made vaccines. As of September 7, 2021, China has finalized agreements to provide more than 1.1 billion Chinese-developed vaccines. This includes the sale of 929.3 million doses and the donation of 45.7 million doses to individual countries, as well as the sale of 174 million doses and donation of 315,000 doses to multilateral groupings (primarily COVAX).

In contrast to its provision of medical supplies, China has provided most of its vaccines to middle-income countries. Only about 2 percent of China’s vaccines have gone to low-income countries. These countries lack the financial wherewithal to purchase large quantities of vaccines, and so far, China has only donated about 5 million doses to them. About 7 percent of Chinese vaccines have gone to a handful of high-income countries. Most wealthy countries have sought vaccines produced by US and European developers Moderna, Pfizer/BioNTech, Johnson & Johnson, and Oxford/AstraZeneca.

In terms of geographical distribution, more than half of Chinese vaccines have gone to two regions: Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and East Asia and the Pacific (EAP). LAC has received more doses (323 million) than any other region, with Brazil (120 million), Mexico (67 million), and Chile (62 million) accounting for most of this. The EAP region has taken in 274 million doses, with the overwhelming majority going to countries in Southeast Asia. Indonesia alone purchased nearly 156 million doses making it the world’s largest recipient of Chinese vaccines by a margin of over 30 million doses. The remaining one-third of China’s vaccines are split up among three other regions, with countries like Turkey (100 million doses), Iran (51 million), Morocco (41 million), and Egypt (20 million) taking in much of this.

Several countries are highly dependent on China for vaccines. Six countries have so far procured 100 percent of their vaccine supply from China. All of them—Chad, Comoros, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, and South Sudan—are low and lower middle-income countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Another 21 countries, predominantly comprising African and Asian countries, procured more than 50 percent of their vaccines from China.

Overall, of the 103 countries that have received Chinese vaccines, their total vaccine supplies have, on average, comprised 39 percent Chinese vaccines (meaning that 61 percent of their supplies have come from non-Chinese vaccines).⁶ Most of the countries that are highly reliant on Chinese vaccines have not received large quantities of Chinese doses. Among the six countries that received 100 percent of their vaccine supply from China, only one (Equatorial Guinea) has received enough vaccines from China to vaccinate more than 20 percent of its population. The other five have only received enough doses to cover less than 10 percent of their population.

In addition to bilateral sales and donations, China has finalized commitments of more than 174 million doses to multilateral organizations. This includes selling 174 million doses to COVAX and 50,000 doses to the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) and donating 300,000 doses to UN Peacekeeping Forces.

The Limitations of China’s Vaccine Diplomacy

China’s vaccine diplomacy appears to have bolstered China’s image and diplomatic leverage in some countries. Yet the full potential of China’s vaccine diplomacy has been watered down by concerns about the efficacy of Chinese vaccines, as well as Beijing’s tendency to sell vaccines bilaterally, rather than donating them to global efforts like COVAX.

As it did with medical supplies, Beijing sought to elevate the impact of delivery of vaccines by extracting public displays of gratitude from recipient country governments. Through mid-September 2021, at least 84 countries held handover ceremonies to publicly welcome the delivery of Chinese vaccines. Nearly two-thirds these countries sent a government official of the rank of minister or cabinet level, or higher. The presidents or prime ministers of five countries (Comoros, the Czech Republic, Lesotho, Hungary, Serbia, Zimbabwe) attended handover ceremonies in person, signaling strong high-level support for Chinese vaccines. Notably, 52 of the 84 countries that held vaccine handover ceremonies also held ceremonies to welcome Chinese medical supplies.  

The leaders of some countries took this a step further. According to media reports, the heads of state or government of at least 26 countries have publicly received jabs of Chinese vaccines. Four of these— Comoros President Azali Assoumani, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, and Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa) were among the heads of state or government who also attended vaccine handover ceremonies in person. Importantly, however, the decision of foreign leaders to receive jabs of Chinese vaccines signal support for Chinese vaccines, but does not necessarily mean that Chinese vaccines are the preferred option of their governments or their population. For example, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was vaccinated with China’s Sinopharm vaccine, but many other top officials in his government did not take Chinese vaccines.

China’s vaccine diplomacy may have offered Beijing leverage to ask some recipient countries to show more support for China’s interests. There is anecdotal evidence of recipients voicing more support for China, particularly immediately before, during, or after vaccine deliveries. This includes recipients releasing statements that support Chinese core interests related to Hong Kong, Xinjiang, and Taiwan. There are also reports of major Chinese vaccine recipients blocking larger regional efforts to criticize Chinese activities. Hungary, for example, blocked EU statements criticizing China in April 2021, just a few weeks after the country purchased millions of doses of Chinese vaccines.

Beijing may have also been able to successfully stifle criticism of China by withholding the provision of vaccines. In the case of Ukraine, China reportedly compelled Kyiv to retract its signature from a statement criticizing China for human rights abuses in Xinjiang by threatening to withhold access to Chinese vaccine and limit bilateral trade.

At the same time, there are signs that the promise of Chinese vaccines was not sufficient for Beijing to advance its interests. Bangladesh did not shy away from publicly pushing back against Chinese warnings about its relationship with the Quad shortly before receiving vaccines from Beijing. Similarly, the promise of receiving Chinese vaccines did not convince any of the 15 nations that maintain official diplomatic relations with Taiwan to switch recognition to mainland China in 2020 or 2021. Amid a painful Covid-19 outbreak, Paraguay publicly debated the possibility of switching ties to mainland China, but authorities in Asunción did not do so, and Paraguay did not receive Chinese vaccines.

Concerns about transparency and the efficacy of Chinese vaccines have been a key limiting factor in Beijing’s vaccine diplomacy push. Many health officials around the world have expressed reservations about Chinese vaccines, especially related to their efficacy (the ability to prevent Covid-19) and safety (risk of serious or adverse effects). Sinopharm’s and Sinovac’s claimed efficacy rates of 79 percent and 51 percent respectively were based on clinical trials that mainly enrolled people from the ages of 18 and 59. In Brazil, this led health authorities to note that local trials of Chinese vaccines could not determine their effectiveness on people aged 60 and over. Similarly, the WHO’s approval of Sinopharm and Sinovac for emergency use was accompanied by caveats that the organization had lower confidence in both vaccines for the elderly as well as those with underlying health problems.

Some countries, such as Costa Rica, ultimately ended discussions to purchase Chinese vaccines out of concerns that the vaccines are not effective enough. Vaccine efficacy concerns also led several governments to reconsider their approach after initially rolling out Chinese vaccines. At least six countries—Bahrain, Cambodia, Chile, Indonesia, Thailand, and the UAE—are recommending or offering a non-Chinese booster shot to those who received Sinovac or Sinopharm vaccines. Malaysia announced that it would phase out Sinovac altogether, switching over to Pfizer/BioNTech once its supply of Sinovac doses runs out. Similarly, Brunei’s Health minister YB Dato Dr Hj Mohd Isham Hj Jaafar announced in September 2021 that AstraZeneca would become the country’s default vaccine, unless people specifically requested Sinopharm.

Singapore’s health ministry decided to omit those who received Sinovac from its official vaccine tally, citing a lack of efficacy data. In one of the most severe blows to a Chinese vaccine, Brazilian authorities announced in September 2021 that they were suspending the use of 12.1 million doses of Sinovac vaccines for at least 90 days after discovering that vials containing the shots were filled at an unauthorized production base.

Another critical factor limiting the impact of China’s vaccine diplomacy has been Beijing’s decision to donate a small proportion of its vaccines compared to major players like the United States and several European countries. Based on finalized vaccine agreements as of September 7, 2021, China’s Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines account for only about 3.8 percent of global vaccine donations. By comparison, the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine developed by the United States and Germany accounts for over 44 percent of global donations. Even if China is able to fully deliver on President Xi’s commitment to donate 100 million more vaccines to developing countries before the end of 2021, Chinese donations would still make up a small portion of global donations, as well as a small proportion of Chinese vaccine exports.

China’s relatively small amount of donations is particularly stark with respect to its allocation of vaccines to COVAX, The United States has finalized commitments to donate 500 million doses to COVAX—about 50 times more than China’s existing commitments. Of the 2 billion doses Chinese President Xi Jinping has said that China will “strive” to donate globally, it is unclear what proportion will go to COVAX and how much of this has been contributed to date. It is also unclear how much of this will be in the form of sales versus donations. In terms of financial support, China has only pledged $100 million to COVAX compared to $3.5 billion from the United States. If Chinese contributions to COVAX primarily come in the form of sales, and if China does not up its financial contributions to the organization, it threatens to undermine Beijing’s efforts to be seen as a major benefactor of international efforts to combat Covid-19.

Summary

To date, China’s medical supplies and vaccine diplomacy has resulted in mixed results for Beijing in terms of its global image and influence. On the medical supplies front, countries were deeply reliant on Chinese medical supplies—especially PPE—during the pandemic. In many countries where China already had significant influence, leaders were willing to provide Beijing with the public displays of gratitude that it desired. In other countries, especially high-income countries, China’s heavy-handed approach to providing medical supplies generated frustration and complaints.

On the vaccine diplomacy front, China extracted displays of praise and support for Chinese vaccines in several countries. At the same time, China’s efforts were undercut by its decision to primarily sell rather than donate vaccines. Many of the countries most reliant on Chinese vaccines have purchased them; only a few countries have received sizable donations of vaccines. China’s vaccine diplomacy has also been limited by concerns about their efficacy, which has been exacerbated by the availability of highly effective competing vaccines.

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