The China Threat Cannot Be Ignored

Lyle Goldstein does not advocate Beijing taking Taiwan over, but the policies that he promotes would lead to that result.

by Gordon G. Chang

The United States is provoking China by supporting Taiwan, at least according to Lyle Goldstein of the Naval War College. 

Writing on this site , he thinks America’s policy is exceedingly dangerous, even likening the United States to the Soviet Union. 

He sees a “Cuban Missile Crisis in reverse.”
The Naval War College scholar suggests that the Pentagon decrease U.S. forces near China and move away from “offensive doctrines” that could result in escalation and ultimately war.
Goldstein raises critical issues. 

He’s right to tell us war can start over Taiwan. 

That, however, will almost surely happen if Washington follows his advice and abandons the island republic to an unappeasable Chinese state.
There’s no mystery how Goldstein could get Taiwan so wrong. 

His perceptions of the situation are factually off-base. 

For instance, he dismisses the disputes between Beijing and Taipei as “family quarrels on the other side of the planet.” 

There is one incorrect assumption and one wrong implication embedded in these nine words.
First, the people of Taiwan do not believe those on the other side of the Taiwan Strait are part of their family. 

At one time, the leaderships of the People’s Republic of China and the Republic of China were linked by the same race, culture and language.
Chiang Kai-shek, who lost the “Chinese civil war,” fled to Taiwan in 1949 with the remnant of his forces. 

The refugees considered themselves Chinese, and, to secure their hold on the island, Chiang led years of brutal persecution of the local population and suppression of Taiwanese culture and language.
Even before Chiang’s party, the Kuomintang, lost power in a series of lopsided electoral defeats this decade, surveys consistently showed more than 60 percent of the population considered themselves to be Taiwanese only while only low single digits self-identified as Chinese only. 

The younger the citizen, the higher the likelihood of self-identification as Taiwanese. 

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping may talk about “Chinese compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan strait are of the same family, whose blood is thicker than water,” but statements like that are rejected by the overwhelming majority of those living in Taiwan.
In any event, more than 70 percent of the island’s population do not believe they are part of “China.”
It is true that Taipei formally maintains it is the legitimate government of China, but Beijing, desperate to keep the bonds between the island and “the mainland” intact, pressures Taiwan to not drop that decades-old claim. 

Those identifying themselves as Taiwanese would almost certainly move to change the name of their country to “Taiwan” absent Chinese intimidation.
So Taiwan and Beijing may quarrel, as Goldstein puts it, but the tussle is certainly not an intra-family one.
Second, Goldstein is correct that Taiwan is “on the other side of the planet,” but his implication that the island is not any business of the United States could not be further from the truth. 

Since the last decades of the nineteenth century, American policymakers have drawn their western defense perimeter not off the coast of California or even Hawaii but off the east coast of Asia. 

Taiwan, at the northern end of the South China Sea and the southern end of the East China Sea, is smack dab in the middle of that first line of defense.
Taiwan helps bottle up the Chinese fleet and air force in China’s peripheral waters—Adm. Ernest King is reputed to have called the island “the cork in the bottle”—and anchors Japan’s defense in the south. 

There are Japanese islands south of Taipei, and on a clear day one can see Taiwan’s mountains from Japanese soil. 

Because Japan is America’s “cornerstone ally” in Asia, defending Taiwan is, in a real sense, defending America.
As the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York told the National Interest, “Taiwan has longed played a strategic role in the Asia-Pacific, and the security of the region is of vital importance to the United States.”
Goldstein’s arguments are wrong on other critical points. 

“China is actually not seeking military conflict with its neighbors, nor even with Taiwan,” he writes. 

“In other words, Beijing’s intentions, even within the maritime sphere, are reasonably benign.”
Yes, Beijing, like all other aggressors in history, would prefer to take without fighting. 

Yet its tactics, when it thinks it can get away with them, often involve the use or threat of use of force.
Its attempt to sever the towed sonar array from the unarmed USNS Impeccable in the South China Sea in March 2009 was an act of war as was the December 2016 seizure of a U.S. Navy drone off the coast of the Philippines and outside Beijing’s audacious nine-dash line. 

The seizure of Scarborough Shoal in early 2012 was an act of aggression, and the blockade of Second Thomas Shoal and moves against other features in the South China Sea and East China Sea are hostile.
The dangerous and fatal encounters Beijing engineers in South Korea’s exclusive economic zone are belligerent. 

So is China’s repeated violation of Japanese air space over and waters surrounding the Senkakus. 

Continuous interference with the U.S. Navy and Air Force in international waters and airspace is unwarranted and often reckless. 

China’s periodic aiming of lasers at the eyes of American pilots, tantamount to attempts to bring down their planes, is not, at least in my book, “benign.”
These actions accompany Beijing all-out assault on legal norms, most notably its unsupportable rejection of the July 2016 arbitral award in Philippines vs. China, a Hague arbitration pursuant to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.
Furthermore, Goldstein ignores the trend of China’s expanding territorial ambitions. 

Once, it maintained ambiguity over the sovereignty of the waters inside its nine or ten dashes on official maps of the South China Sea. 

Now, it issues official statements about peripheral seas as “blue national soil.” 

There is also an August 2011 official statement , quantifying the country’s territorial waters, that can only be read as a claim to most of the South China Sea.
Similarly, Beijing once acknowledged Japanese sovereignty over the Senkakus. Now, Beijing claims them as the Diaoyus. 

This decade, state media has been supporting state institutions that have been laying groundwork to a sovereignty claim to Japan’s Okinawa and the rest of the Ryukyu chain.
Yes, the People’s Republic is neither the Third Reich nor the Russian Federation, but the dynamic is the same: aggressors do not stop until they are stopped.
Goldstein has causation backwards when he thinks Washington is triggering another Cuban Missile Crisis. 

“Handbags are snatched because women carry them provocatively; pogroms kill because Jews wear yarmulkes; rape is caused by sexy clothes; and oh, yes, World War II was sparked by Czech threats to Germany,” Arthur Waldron of the University of Pennsylvania told the National Interest last week. 

“Surely Professor Goldstein understands that China is an aggressive state?”
Whatever Goldstein understands, he sees the wrong solution. 

He spends much of his National Interest piece touting China’s operational capabilities and making them look almost “insurmountable,” as James Fanell, a retired U.S. Navy intelligence officer and now a leading analyst of China’s naval forces, told me. 

“American, Taiwan, and Japanese military planners should be developing lethal counters to Chinese avenues of attack,” Fanell recommends. 

As he points out, “direct and unambiguous military deterrence by the U.S.” can keep the peace.
“Taiwan is emphatically not a ‘core interest’ of the U.S. and Chinese leaders are all too aware of that glaring truth,” Goldstein writes, concluding his National Interest piece. 

He would be right if he wrote that American policymakers have yet to make it clear that Taiwan is a core interest.
Yet it is, in reality, core to the United States, and not only because it anchors America’s western perimeter. 

It is core these days because Beijing has been continually attacking not only U.S. democratic institutions but also the concept of representative governance itself. 

China’s rulers, unfortunately, have launched an assault on everything not both communist and Chinese.
Goldstein surely does not advocate Beijing taking Taiwan over, but the policies he promotes would surely lead to that result. 

He is wrong on most assumptions he makes, and so his conclusion, that Taiwan is not important, is therefore fundamentally wrong. 

As the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York notes, the United States and Taiwan share values, making it “even more crucial for us to work together to defend our values and ensure peace and stability of the region.”
And the peace and stability of the world. 

Not since the early 1950s—and maybe not even then—has the safety and security of Taiwan been so critical to the United States and to the international system.

Kazakh trial throws spotlight on China’s internment centres

Beijing’s crackdown in East Turkestan puts central Asian neighbours on edge 
By Emily Feng in Beijing

Sayragul Sauytbay has requested asylum in Kazakhstan. She had been forced to teach prisoners in a Chinese internment camp.
The trial of a Chinese citizen who fled to Kazakhstan has offered rare insight into China’s secretive internment centres, with Beijing’s security campaign in East Turkestan increasingly putting neighbouring countries in central Asia on edge.
 The trial, which is being held in the Kazakh town of Zharkent near the Chinese border, has featured the first public testimony describing China’s internment system in East Turkestan, alarming Chinese officials who have long obscured their existence. 
 Sayragul Sauytbay, a Kazakh with Chinese citizenship, in April fled East Turkestan where she was forced to teach Chinese history to prisoners at an internment centre.
She then requested asylum in Kazakhstan, where her husband and two children are citizens.
 On May 21, Ms Sauytbay was detained by Kazakh security officials for allegedly crossing the border into Kazakhstan illegally — a charge that could see her deported to China.
Friends and family say she is being targeted by the Chinese Communist party for possessing political secrets because of her employment at an internment centre. 
 Since 2016, China has intensified a security campaign in East Turkestan ostensibly aimed at countering Islamist and separatist "terror".
The crackdown has targeted Uighurs, a Turkic Muslim ethnic group.
Among the measures are a regional network of extra-legal internment camps that hold at least 500,000 of the region’s 11m Uighurs.
 “The people in East Turkestan definitely do not know the severe degree the centres have reached, how many have died [there] and how many have gone crazy. Those who know cannot say because once they do they will face consequences,” said Silamu Wuwali, Ms Sauytbay’s husband.
“We are very worried for her physical safety.”
 In her testimony, Ms Sauytbay said details about the operations of internment centres were classified as state secrets and their disclosure was punishable by execution. 
 Deliberations were scheduled to end last week but have been extended to begin again on Wednesday after the judge rejected Ms Sauytbay’s plea bargain to face criminal charges in Kazakhstan rather than be deported to China.
 “Ms Sauytbay is at a real risk of torture and ill-treatment and of arbitrary detention if returned to China,” her lawyers said in a statement.
Kazakhstan is a party to both the UN Convention against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which bans expelling a person to where they face a risk of torture.
As the clampdown intensifies, regional neighbours have been swept up by China’s widening security dragnet.
Particularly affected has been resource-rich Kazakhstan, one of China’s key partners in its Belt and Road Initiative.
 For decades, ethnic Kazakhs crossed relatively freely between China and Kazakhstan.
But since China’s security crackdown began in 2016, at least 10 Kazakh citizens have been detained in East Turkestan.
Ms Sauytbay testified that she taught at a East Turkestan internment camp that was built to hold almost 2,500 Chinese Kazakhs.
 Kazakh interest surrounding the trial has been such that it prompted China’s ambassador in Kazakhstan, Zhang Wei, to speak out in July.
 “This year, we have noticed different individuals zealously campaigning about the so-called problems of the ethnic Kazakhs from East Turkestan,” he said in an interview with Tengrinews, one of the largest online news outlets in Kazakhstan. 
 “They have done this on the internet and out in public, openly and secretly, inventing unfounded accusations with the evil intent of staining East Turkestan's image and grossly interfering in China’s internal affairs.”

U.S.-Led Infrastructure Aid to Counter China in Indo-Pacific

• Australia, Japan link with ally to fund ‘peace and prosperity’
• Pact enhances Trump’s evolving national security policies

By Jason Scott
Julie Bishop 

The U.S., Japan and Australia agreed to invest in infrastructure projects in the Indo-Pacific in a move seen as a counter to China’s rising influence in a region that stretches from the east coast of Africa, through Australia to Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean.
“This trilateral partnership is in recognition that more support is needed to enhance peace and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region,” Australia Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said Tuesday in an emailed statement. 

The pact will mobilize investment in energy, transportation, tourism and technology infrastructure, according to the statement, which didn’t give any funding details.
The announcement comes after U.S. President Donald Trump’s National Security Strategy in December called for policies to answer rival powers’ infrastructure-building efforts. 

Chief among these is Chinese dictator Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative, a global plan to build or expand highways, railways, ports, pipelines and power plants that Morgan Stanley forecasts could grow as large as $1.3 trillion over the next decade.
U.S. infrastructure cooperation with Japan and Australia would dovetail with the Trump administration’s evolving national security policies, which have cast the U.S. as in “long-term, strategic competition” with China and Russia. 

Beijing’s BRI calls for half a trillion dollars in investment in infrastructure along trade routes to China, which is expected to overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest economy before 2030.
Before visiting China in November, Trump signed two deals with Japan, pledging cooperation on infrastructure projects in the region.
Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, speaking Monday before a trip to Asia amid an escalating trade war with China, said the U.S. believes in “strategic partnerships, not strategic dependency” -- a veiled criticism of Beijing’s efforts to woo countries with cheap financing for infrastructure projects.
“With American companies, citizens around the world know that what you see is what you get: honest contracts, honest terms and no need for off-the-books nonsense,” Pompeo said. 

Another advantage of the U.S. is that “we will help them keep their people free from coercion or great power domination,” he said.
Pompeo is likely to make announcements about the pact’s funding arrangements during his visit to Asia, which will include Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, according to Stephen Kirchner, director of trade and investment program at the U.S. Studies Centre at the University of Sydney.
“This is designed to provide mechanism that will allow more private-sector funding for the infrastructure projects that countries in this region need,” Kirchner said. 

That will mean it will operate in different ways to established funds such as the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, he said.
In February, Bishop said the three nations, along with India, had discussed opportunities to address “the enormous need for infrastructure” in the region, which encompasses some of the world’s poorest as well as fastest-growing economies.
India wasn’t mentioned in Tuesday’s announcement. 

Instead, the pact will be organized by the U.S.’s Overseas Private Investment Corp., the Japanese Bank for International Cooperation and Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
“This partnership represents our commitment to an Indo-Pacific region that is free, open and prosperous,” the three nations said in a joint statement issued on Monday, according to Bishop. 

The trilateral partnership will be formalized “in due course,” Bishop said.

Strained Ties
Australia’s diplomatic relationship with China has been strained since December when Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Chinese meddling in the nation’s government and media were a catalyst for new anti-foreign interference laws, which passed parliament last month.
China lodged a formal protest with Australia in January after Turnbull’s minister for international development, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, said the Belt and Road plan risked building “useless buildings” and “roads to nowhere.”
Australian Trade Minister Steve Ciobo denied the new pact was designed to counter China and said he wasn’t expecting a backlash from Beijing.
“Why would there be any?” Ciobo said in a Sky News interview on Tuesday. 

“The fact is that we demonstrate consistently that Australia is very focused on making sure we can help the least-developed economies in our region.”

The Trump Effect

Trade War Casualties: Factories Shifting Out Of China
By Kenneth Rapoza

Supply chains starting to shift at a faster pace as companies look to avoid tariffs.

China-based manufacturers were already in the process of moving to lower-cost Southeast Asia. 

Now that trade tariffs have been enacted on at least $50 billion worth of goods, and another $200 billion likely by summer's end, they are shifting their supply chain. 

It's happening.
“With recent tariff battles, companies aren’t as eager to have production in China,” says Nathan Resnick, CEO of startup company Sourcify. 

The business-to-business manufacturing platform has offices in San Diego and Guangzhou. 

“We run production runs in India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Philippines, and Mexico right now. Labor costs are actually more affordable outside of China, so for products like apparel where there is a lot of cut-and-sew labor, most companies are moving out of China anyway,” he says. 

Sourcify raised $2.5 million through Y Combinator this winter. 

“I’ve been going back and forth to China for years, and it is getting more expensive. With all these tariffs coming, why not run some of your production runs elsewhere? Companies are saying that the scare of these tariffs has decreased the incentives to manufacture in China.”
Sourcify is small, but Kerry Logistics Network, a Hong Kong-listed firm owned by Malaysia’s billionaire Kuok family, is not. 

The South China Morning Post reported that Kerry shifted part of its production lines from mainland China to its corporate home further south in order to avoid tariffs.
“Our clients have been shifting part of their production lines as early as March from China to other Asian countries where they already have manufacturing plants,” William Ma Wing-kai, Kerry's managing director, was quoted saying in the Hong Kong daily. 

“This is a reallocation of global production bases,” Ma said.
For the last couple of years, China has been moving to a more automated assembly line, pushing lower-cost manufacturing to Vietnam and elsewhere. 

China is now one of the world's largest producers of robotics used in manufacturing assembly lines. As the country moves up the value chain, old-school labor like stitch-and-sew apparel manufacturing is leaving the country.
Now that the tariffs are in place, with more promised, companies that were considering relocating are doing so sooner than planned.
In recent interviews with the British press, Goldman Sachs and Trump administration alum Steve Bannon said that the policies of the new White House ultimately seek to remap global supply chains in favor of American manufacturing.

China's currency has been weakening on trade war fears and now... falling interest rates. 
China has been reacting to President Trump's measures. 

Each tariff imposed on them has been met in kind by tariffs against American imports. 

President Trump has proposed $200 billion more, but Xi Jinping has not retaliated with similar numbers.
China's Ministry of Commerce said Thursday that the country would abide by World Trade Organization rules and would like to see them fixed for the better of globalization.
"China is supportive of WTO reform and hopes the reform will address the concerns of most members and reflect their needs," Ministry of Commerce spokesperson Gao Feng said at a press conference last week. 

"It's better to avoid a trade war."
China has responded to the current trade war by providing new fiscal stimulus, including tax breaks.
Chinese premier Li Keqiang came out of nowhere last week, saying that Beijing would do everything possible to prop up the domestic economy in light of a trade war. 

Mainland equities are down over 20% since their highs reached in mid-January. 

Investors are expecting a looser monetary policy from the central bank. 

But foreign investors also face a weaker Chinese currency, meaning forex risks will eat up gains in the A-shares.
GDP growth remained largely solid at 6.8% in the first half, with retail sales and property investment holding steady. 

Now that the trade dispute is heating up, things are seen taking a turn for the worse. 

A slight weakening was spotted in June industrial output and investment, and worries have been on the rise that escalating trade tensions could bite into the economy in a couple of months. 

A full scale trade war, wherein President Trump's high water mark of $500 billion in tariffs is reached, is forecast to take at least a half-percent off of Chinese GDP, based on research by Matthews Asia, a San Francisco-based mutual fund company.
Tariffs are hurting China.
The country is expanding imports steadily with some items heavily reliant on the U.S. market. 

For instance, China tariffs on soybeans are 25%. 

Chinese traders are now forced to either pay 25% more for American beans or go to Brazil and pay just about the same price even without the tariff. 

Brazil is always more expensive than the U.S.
In the next five years, imports are expected to hit $8 trillion, a potential boon to U.S. companies... providing China lets them in.

Rogue Nation

Chinese Parents Protest Bad Vaccines for Hundreds of Thousands

By Javier C. Hernández

A child receiving a vaccination in Jiujiang, China, this month. The uproar over the defective vaccines has undermined Xi Jinping’s vow to eliminate corruption and abuse in the nation’s food and drug industries.

BEIJING — More than two dozen Chinese parents, shouting phrases including “Justice for the victims,” gathered outside a government building in Beijing on Monday to protest a vaccine scandal that has become one of the most visible public health crises in China in recent years.
The protest followed reports this month that hundreds of thousands of children across China had been injected with faulty vaccines for diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough.
While the children appear to be unharmed, the episode undermined Xi Jinping’s vision of a newly resilient China and his vow to eliminate corruption and abuse in the nation’s food and drug industries.
The protesters, standing outside the offices of the National Health Commission, called for stricter oversight of China’s drug industry, according to interviews with parents and images posted on social media. 

Holding a banner showing photos of children, the demonstrators rejected assurances by Chinese leaders that the issue was under control.
“The problem is not solved,” He Fangmei, the mother of a 2-year-old girl, said in a telephone interview after the protest. 

“Our concerns have not been addressed.”



夏昙畅@VOAJiangHe
7月30日上午，大批假疫苗受害者家属在国家卫生健康委员会门口进行抗议！

The latest crisis is the third involving vaccines in China since 2010. 

In a bid to restore confidence in China’s vast pharmaceutical industry, Xi has ordered a nationwide investigation of vaccine producers.
The police on Sunday announced plans to arrest 18 employees of the vaccine producer at the center of the scandal, Changchun Changsheng, in northeastern China, including the company’s chairwoman, Gao Junfang.
The authorities say the company violated standards in producing more than 250,000 doses of the vaccines for diphtheria, whooping cough and tetanus, and tampered with data in producing a rabies vaccine. 

While the vaccines were not harmful, officials say, they left children at risk of contracting illnesses that they should have been protected against.
Another company involved in the scandal, the state-owned Wuhan Institute of Biological Products in central China, is accused of producing more than 400,000 vaccines that did not meet standards.
While regulators forced the Wuhan Institute of Biological Products to pay a fine, many parents express concern that the authorities have not punished the company more severely because of its government ties.
Public health experts say the problems at the two companies could lead to a broader backlash against vaccines in China.
The protests on Monday, coupled with an outpouring of anger on social media in recent days, suggested that many parents were having doubts about allowing their children to be injected with vaccines made in China.
Dr. Gauden Galea, the representative of the World Health Organization in China, said the government, which often favors secrecy in investigations, would need to be transparent to restore faith in immunizations.
“They need to ask and answer more questions than the population is asking in order to earn the trust back,” he said.
The protests on Monday were an unusual challenge to the government, which has deployed censors to limit discussion of the vaccine crisis online.
Xi, China’s most powerful leader in decades, has sought to justify his top-down rule with promises of higher living standards. 

But analysts say that incidents like the vaccine uproar could damage his credibility.
Merriden Varrall, an expert on China at the Lowy Institute, a research organization in Australia, said that because many Chinese families have only one child, scandals that involve potential harm to children are considered particularly egregious.
“How is this still happening in a China that people are told is really on track for rejuvenation?” she said. 

“Scandals like this are simply not going to be accepted as par for the course anymore.”

Paper Dragon: Just How Good Is China's Military?

Fact: China lost the last war it fought... in 1979. 

By Harry J. Kazianis


While America’s ideas for negating A2/AD are important, Washington must move to the next level of operational and strategic planning. 

The United States must begin to develop a comprehensive strategy to deal with A2/AD, and specifically Chinese A2/AD, and move past vague and often-contradictory operational concepts. 

At the same time, considering the alliances and strategic partnerships Washington holds throughout the Asia-Pacific and wider Indo-Pacific, allies must be consulted as such a strategy is developed. While marketing slogans like a “pivot” or “rebalance” sound good on paper or in the headlines, a strategy must be adopted that continues America’s military edge in the Asia-Pacific for years to come.
China’s military is growing in terms of raw power and basic power projection. 

Many of Beijing’s defense investments over the last two decades are aimed at limiting Washington’s ability to intervene in areas that China describes as being of “core interest.” 

But just how much should Washington worry about it? 

A good question, for sure. 

The answer, however, is as not as black and white as many might want it to be. 

And just how much should America prepare to duel with such anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) forces in the future?
Let’s start with the obvious: While various A2/AD combat scenarios can paint a decidedly bleak picture for America and its allies in Asia in the event of a conflict with China, there are a number of reasons such a war will never come to pass in the first place. 

While large trade flows have not stopped conflicts in the past, with U.S.-Chinese bilateral trade now valued at over $550 billion and growing, this vital statistic would likely be an important factor in both sides’ strategic calculus on a path towards some sort of large-scale kinetic conflict. 

However, as history has shown us, the rise of a new regional great power with the potential to wield hegemonic dominance can spark a security competition, even war. 

This is one of the key reasons nations in the Asia-Pacific have looked to Washington to provide a hedge or a “buffer” against a rapidly rising China.
One must also consider the simple fact that there have been many so-called “revolutions” in military affairs dating back to the beginning of human history. 

While China’s version of the A2/AD strategy boasts weapons that have headline-grabbing names, like “carrier-killer,” and are certainly cause for concern, one must look back to the past at how other nations have worked to negate potential changes in how wars are conducted and how new technologies impact modern warfare. 

One example is China’s DF-21D, the “carrier-killer” itself. 

The U.S. Navy has faced challenges to its dominance of the global commons at various times in the past. 

How will America deal with such a challenge this time around? 

In analyzing the DF-21D, what many consider the most potent A2/AD challenge facing U.S. and allied forces today, such tests have been met before, according to one source, and will be addressed yet again :
While a major advance in military capability, it is not the first “game changing” weapon system mitigated or countered by the U.S. Navy. 

The naval mine, the self-propelled torpedo, the submarine, the airplane and the cruise missile all presented the same potentially lethal threat to surface warships. 

While naval leaders should respect the power of this weapon system, there is no reason to endow it with supernatural abilities or allow it to unilaterally limit operational thinking. 

As in the past, the inevitable march of technology will find an effective countermeasure or mitigating technique for this system and the DF-21D will just be another threat in a constellation of dangers inherent in the pursuit of war at sea.
To expand this line of thinking to the whole of A2/AD (and specifically Chinese A2/AD), the ideas inherent in such a strategy—limiting the ability of your enemy’s freedom of movement or, in an even broader sense, looking for weaknesses—are certainly rooted in past strategic and military thought. 

In fact, many other nations have used anti-access or area-denial–type strategies—the USSR and Imperial Japan are two often-cited examples. 

Strategic thinkers from competing nations are constantly looking for ways to negate and minimize the impact of new technologies, strategies and weapons systems. 

A2/AD, at its core, is part of a long line of past and present potentially disruptive military strategies that planners from around the world will now seek to improve on, mimic and defeat.
All in all, Washington must take a balanced approach towards China’s A2/AD challenge—not overhyping the threat, but certainly not underappreciating the challenge, either. 

In the very near future (some would argue even today), American strategists must now factor in the challenges presented by an increasingly robust Chinese military that holds growing capabilities to effectively deny large sections of the Pacific Ocean to U.S. forces. 

American defense experts are already at work recognizing the challenge and are developing the tools to negate such a scenario. 

Washington clearly realizes A2/AD weapons and strategies are diffusing around the globe, putting American and allied forces in danger, unless they evolve or adapt. 

This is why work towards the Third Offset strategy and the successor to ASB, JAM-GC, are of vital importance.
While America’s ideas for negating A2/AD are important, Washington must move to the next level of operational and strategic planning. 

The United States must begin to develop a comprehensive strategy to deal with A2/AD, and specifically Chinese A2/AD, and move past vague and often-contradictory operational concepts. 

At the same time, considering the alliances and strategic partnerships Washington holds throughout the Asia-Pacific and wider Indo-Pacific, allies must be consulted as such a strategy is developed. While marketing slogans like a “pivot” or “rebalance” sound good on paper or in the headlines, a strategy must be adopted that continues America’s military edge in the Asia-Pacific for years to come.

Poisoning the World

China recalls tainted heart medicine from stores worldwide

By Ben Westcott and Yong Xiong

A medicine manufacturer in China is undertaking an international recall of active substances used in a commonly-used heart medicine which were found to contain traces of a dangerous carcinogen, the government announced Sunday.
It is the second major Chinese medical controversy in less than a month, after hundreds of thousands of children's vaccines were revealed to be faulty, putting an unknown number of infants at risk.
Valsartan, a drug used to treat high-blood pressure and prevent heart failure, was recalled in 22 countries across Europe and North America earlier in July after batches were found to contain N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA), an organic chemical that belongs to a family of potent carcinogens.
The substances were supplied by Zhejiang Huahai Pharmaceuticals (ZHP), based in Linhai, in eastern China, who said they notified authorities as soon as they identified the impurity.
"We published our recall notice at midday on July 13 in China and overseas, and published the US market recall notice on July 14 Beijing time ... all the drug materials for the Chinese market were recalled by July 23," the company said in a statement to the Shanghai stock exchange Monday.
On July 16, ZHP said it had pulled all Valsartan products from US pharmacies, a market worth $20 million in sales for the company in 2017.
Animal studies using NDMA have shown it to cause liver, kidney and respiratory track tumors. Following the revelation, China's Food and Drug Administration said it had conducted a screening of all the country's suppliers of the Valsartan ingredients, including ZHP.
The early recall involved around 2,300 batches of the ingredient. 

Among the countries it was sent to were Germany, Canada, France, and Sweden.
According to Xinhua, ZHP has taken "needed measures" to put it back in line with regulations.

Chinese peril
The recent drug scandals come at a time when the Chinese government is attempting to rebuild trust, both domestically and internationally, in the quality of the country's products.
The government announced in mid-July it had discovered an estimated 250,000 doses of a diphtheria and tetanus (DPT) vaccine made by Changchun Changsheng Biotechnology and intended for young children were faulty, sparking widespread panic.
So far, 15 people have been detained, including the company's chairman, Gao Junfang, but the reaction on China's social media was fast and fierce before censors intervened.
"My home country, how can I trust you? You just let me down again and again," one user commented on social media.
Just days before the DPT vaccine announcement, more than 100,000 doses of a rabies vaccine produced by the same company were also found to be defective.
Major international scandals have badly damaged the country's reputation, such as the 2008 tainted milk formula scandal which put thousands of children at risk.
More recently in 2016, a criminal organization was found to be selling millions of improperly stored vaccines.
The Chinese government is still deeply reluctant to allow its citizens to criticize the handling of these scandals.
An initially open attitude to the vaccine crisis by the government, including a number of unusually vocal editorials in state media, was rapidly shut down as the outrage continued to grow.
Posts on the Chinese social media site Weibo were erased, as well as private chats on messaging application WeChat, while state media pivoted to act as a reassuring voice for confused parents.
The official mouthpiece of the Communist Party, the People's Daily, ran an interview in the past week with an expert alleging the vaccines were "safe," just ineffective.
Evidence in support of these claims has yet to be provided by authorities, nor has any estimate been given for how many children were injected with the faulty vaccines.

China is trying to muzzle Gui Minhai. These poems tell his story.

By Fred Hiatt

Gui Minhai in an undated photo. 

Gui Minhai, a Chinese-born Swedish citizen, was riding a train from Shanghai to Beijing in the company of two Swedish diplomats in January when 10 Chinese plainclothesmen stormed aboard, lifted him up and carried him off the train and out of sight.
Three weeks later, Gui was paraded before Chinese media to recite a bizarre and apparently coerced confession. 

He hasn’t been heard from since.
This is what passes for the rule of law in China today.
I think of Gui sometimes when I hear Chinese dictator Xi Jinping boasting about a country that “has stood up, grown rich and is becoming strong.”
Would a truly strong and self-confident nation behave this way? 

Why would it feel the need to kidnap — for the second time, no less — a peaceable 54-year-old gentleman such as Gui and keep him, in poor health, locked up for, now, more than a thousand days?
Gui left China as a young man to study in Sweden and got marooned there when the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre rendered his home country inhospitable to anyone inclined toward democracy. 

He earned a Phd, married, had a daughter, Angela, who is now, at 24, beginning her own PhD studies at the University of Cambridge in England.
Eventually, as the political climate in China eased, Gui moved back. 

He established a book business in Hong Kong, where he published insider accounts from China’s Communist Party — books that were banned in China itself.
In October 2015, he disappeared from his small vacation home in Thailand. 

That was the first abduction, followed by the first bizarre confession: Gui showed up on television in January 2016 claiming he had voluntarily returned to China to take responsibility for a long-ago hit-and-run car accident.
Angela could never find out where he was being held, but last fall he was released into a kind of house arrest in Ningbo, a coastal city south of Shanghai, where he was allowed to resume a careful communication with his daughter.
He told her that, while in prison, he had been composing poems. 

His captors had not permitted him pen and paper, but he had committed them to memory — and last fall he began writing them down and sending them to his daughter.
In one, he compares himself to a Père David’s deer — a species that, by the time a French missionary became in the 19th century the first Westerner to see it, existed only in captivity, in the Chinese emperor’s hunting preserve.
“When I was caught I started to evolve/When I started to evolve, I was tamed,” Gui wrote. 

“But while I am shamed in the swamp/I still yearn to run through the Swedish woods.”
Also last fall, Gui began to notice alarming signs of neurological deterioration — perhaps a result of maltreatment in captivity; perhaps, as a Ningbo doctor believed, early signs of ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease.
“He was very shaken by this,” Angela recalled. 

“He told me, ‘I’m not afraid to die, I’m just not ready yet. There’s so much more to be done.’”
The Ningbo doctor said he should see a specialist; the Swedish government agreed to send one to Beijing; China’s ambassador to Sweden said Gui would be permitted to travel to the capital for the exam. 

It was on the way to that appointment that he was, again, abducted. 

And at his next “confession,” he was being charged, even more absurdly, with stealing “state secrets.”
What kind of state secrets could Gui possess after nearly three years in captivity?
Angela wonders, sadly, if the secret is not the case itself — a story that has become such an embarrassment of injustice atop injustice that the Communist Party can’t bring itself to turn her father loose.
All of this is happening while, given America’s forfeiture of global standing, China is, understandably, trying to present itself as an alternative model. 

Yet how can its leaders convince the world that they are “an unstoppable and invincible force” (that’s Xi, again) if they fear a man such as Gui Minhai? 

Who wants to imitate a regime that behaves like gangsters?
Angela hopes the Chinese will let her father see a doctor. 

She hopes his health is not deteriorating. 

Sometimes she even lets herself dream that her father — who was not there to see her graduate at the top of her class this spring — will be with her when she earns her next degree.
Today, The Post is proud to publish two of Gui Minhai’s poems for the first time. 

Like Angela, I hope he will be free and publishing a full volume of his verse before too long.
“There is so much more he wanted to do,” she says. 

“There was so much he wanted to tell people.”

Père David’s Deer
By Gui Minhai, translated by Anne Henochowicz

Under the harsh light day and night
I quickly turned into a Père David’s deer
it took only seven hundred days or so
for my graying hair to evolve into antlers

These strange creatures don’t live here
they say my name is “Neither Fish Nor Fowl”
When I was caught I started to evolve
When I started to evolve, I was tamed

As soon as my clothes were peeled away
I became a tamed David’s deer
I sobbed in front of the cameras
admitting I was a deer that had strayed away

In the secret garden, my swift devolution
turned speech into furry groans
turned a hat into a black hood
turned nationality and citizenship into diplomatic dispute

In every Chinese encyclopedia, it is written
that Père David’s deer is a rare beast unique to China
thus one such deer, at ease in the Swedish forest
began a new life in an Asian swamp

I am a devolved David’s deer
unable to choke down poems or prose
but while I am shamed in the swamp
I still yearn to run through the Swedish woods.

first written in prison
rewritten Dec. 10, 2017

Heroism
By Gui Minhai, translated by Anne Henochowicz

When I was young, I cared for a cute little chicken
in the time of my childhood it laid an egg
an egg that shone toward the sun’s light
with a round, round yolk inside its shell

I took this egg with me everywhere
and made many yolk-yellow drawings
when even the moon was curved with exhaustion
I dreamed dreams as round as a yolk

Only when a pair of boots trampled my egg
did I know how frail an eggshell is
the forlorn, helpless yolk on the ground
the egg white flowing out like tears

A bare chicken egg is so weak
after the yolk had been ravaged
I curled into a ball, surrendered the egg’s genetic code
and admitted I really was a duck egg

I burn to my end in the red-hot pan
only because I have this humble notion:
once I’m fried into a fat omelette
a hero’s death will be wrapped inside me

written Dec. 27, 2017

Trojan Horse: From a Space Station in Argentina, China Expands Its Reach in Latin America

By Ernesto Londoño

The Chinese space station, including a 16-story-tall parabolic antenna, in a remote area of Argentina’s Patagonia region.

QUINTUCO, Argentina — The giant antenna rises from the desert floor like an apparition, a gleaming metal tower jutting 16 stories above an endless wind-whipped stretch of Patagonia.
The 450-ton device, with its hulking dish embracing the open skies, is the centerpiece of a $50 million satellite and space mission control station built by the Chinese military.
The isolated base is one of the most striking symbols of Beijing’s long push to transform Latin America and shape its future for generations to come — often in ways that directly undermine the United States’ political, economic and strategic power in the region.
The station began operating in March, playing a pivotal role in China’s expedition to the far side of the moon — an endeavor that Argentine officials say they are elated to support.
But the way the base was negotiated — in secret, at a time when Argentina desperately needed investment — and concerns that it enhances China’s intelligence gathering capabilities in the hemisphere have set off a debate in Argentina about the risks of being pulled into China’s orbit.
“Beijing has transformed the dynamics of the region, from the agendas of its leaders and businessmen to the structure of its economies, the content of its politics and even its security dynamics,” said R. Evan Ellis, a professor of Latin American studies at the United States Army War College.

China, with Argentina’s help, is engaged in a bold effort to explore the far side of the moon. A satellite was launched from China in May to aid the effort.

For much of the past decade, the United States has paid little attention to its backyard in the Americas. 

Instead, it declared a pivot toward Asia, hoping to strengthen economic, military and diplomatic ties as part of the Obama administration’s strategy to constrain China.
Since taking office, the Trump administration has retreated from that approach in some fundamental ways, walking away from a free trade pact with Pacific nations, launching a global trade war and complaining about the burden of Washington’s security commitments to its closest allies in Asia and other parts of the world.
All the while, China has been discreetly carrying out a far-reaching plan of its own across Latin America.

It has vastly expanded trade, bailed out governments, built enormous infrastructure projects, strengthened military ties and locked up tremendous amounts of resources, hitching the fate of several countries in the region to its own.
China made its intentions clear enough back in 2008. 

In a first-of-its-kind policy paper that drew relatively little notice at the time, Beijing argued that nations in Latin America were “at a similar stage of development” as China, with much to gain on both sides.
Leaders in the region were more than receptive. 

The primacy over Latin America that Washington had largely taken for granted since the end of the Cold War was being challenged by a cadre of leftist presidents who governed much of the region — including Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, Ecuador, Uruguay and Bolivia — and wanted a more autonomous region.
Beijing’s invitation came at a fortuitous time: during the height of the financial crisis. 

Latching onto China’s voracious appetite for the region’s oil, iron, soybeans and copper ended up shielding Latin America from the worst of the global economic damage.
Then, as the price of oil and other commodities tanked in 2011, several countries in the region suddenly found themselves on shaky ground. 

Once again, China came to their aid, striking deals that further cemented its role as a central player in Latin America for decades.
Even with parts of Latin America shifting to the right politically in recent years, its leaders have tailored their policies to fulfill China’s demand. 

Now Beijing’s dominance in much of the region — and what it means for America’s waning stature — is starting to come into sharp focus.
“It’s a fait accompli,” said Diego Guelar, Argentina’s ambassador to China.
Back in 2013, he published a book with an alarming-sounding title: “The Silent Invasion: The Chinese Landing in South America.”
“It’s no longer silent,” Mr. Guelar said of China’s incursion in the region.
Trade between China and countries in Latin America and the Caribbean reached $244 billion last year, more than twice what it was a decade earlier, according to Boston University’s Global Development Policy Center. 

Since 2015, China has been South America’s top trading partner, eclipsing the United States.
Perhaps more significantly, China has issued tens of billions of dollars in commodities-backed loans across the Americas, giving it claim over a large share of the region’s oil — including nearly 90 percent of Ecuador’s reserves — for years.
China has also made itself indispensable by rescuing embattled governments and vital state-controlled companies in countries like Venezuela and Brazil, willing to make big bets to secure its place in the region.
Here in Argentina, a nation that had been shut out of international credit markets for defaulting on about $100 billion in bonds, China became a godsend for then-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.
And while it was extending a helping hand, China began the secret negotiations that led to the satellite and space control station here in Patagonia.

Satellite imagery of China’s space station in Argentina.
Argentine officials say the Chinese have agreed not to use the base for military purposes. 

But experts contend that the technology on it has many strategic uses.
Frank A. Rose, an assistant secretary of state for arms control during the Obama administration, said he spent much of his time worrying about China’s budding space program. 

American intelligence and defense officials watched with alarm as China developed sophisticated technology to jam, disrupt and destroy satellites in recent years, he said.
“They are deploying these capabilities to blunt American military advantages, which are in many ways derived from space,” Mr. Rose said.
China is not alone in regarding space as a critical battlespace for future wars.

Last month, the Trump administration announced it would create a sixth military branch devoted to space.
Antennas and other equipment that support space missions, like the kind China now has here in Patagonia, can increase China’s intelligence-gathering capabilities.
“A giant antenna is like a giant vacuum cleaner,” said Dean Cheng, a former congressional investigator who studies China’s national security policy. 

“What you are sucking up is signals, data, all sorts of things.”
Lt. Col. Christopher Logan, a Pentagon spokesman, said American military officials were assessing the implications of the Chinese monitoring station.
Chinese officials declined requests for interviews about the base and their space program.
Beyond any strategic contest with the United States, some leaders in Latin America are now having doubts and regrets about their ties to China, worried that past governments have saddled their nations with enormous debt and effectively sold out their futures.
But Mr. Guelar argued that hitting the brakes on engagement with China would be shortsighted, particularly at a time when Washington has given up its longstanding role as the region’s political and economic anchor.
“There has been an abdication” of leadership by the United States, he said.
“It surrendered that role not because it lost it, but because it doesn’t wish to take it on.”

The entrance to a Chinese area in Buenos Aires.

‘A Window to the World’
The Argentine government was in crisis mode in 2009.
Inflation was high.
Billions of dollars in debt payments were coming due.
Anger was swelling over the government, including its decision to nationalize $30 billion in private pension funds.
And the worst drought in five decades was making the economic situation even more bleak.
Enter China, which stepped forward to brighten the outlook.
First, it struck a $10.2 billion currency swap deal that helped stabilize the Argentine peso, and then promised to invest $10 billion to fix the nation’s dilapidated rail system.
In the middle of all this, China also dispatched a team to Argentina to discuss something that had nothing to do with currency fluctuations: Beijing’s ambitions in space.
The Chinese wanted a satellite-tracking hub on the other side of the globe before the launch of an expedition to the far side of the moon, which never faces the Earth.
If successful, the mission, scheduled to launch this year, will be a milestone in space exploration, potentially paving the way for the extraction of helium 3, which some scientists believe could provide a revolutionary clean source of energy.
China Satellite Launch and Tracking Control General, a division of the country’s armed forces, settled on this windswept 494-acre patch in Argentina’s Neuquén Province.
Flanked by mountains and far from population centers, the site offered an ideal vantage point for Beijing to monitor satellites and space missions around the clock.
Félix Clementino Menicocci, the secretary general of Argentina’s National Space Activities Commission, a government agency, said the Chinese had pitched officials with promises of economic development and the prospect of enabling a history-making endeavor.
“They’ve become major players in space in the span of a few years,” Mr. Menicocci said of China’s space program.
After months of secret negotiations, Neuquén Province and the Chinese government signed a deal in November 2012, giving China the right to the land — rent free — for 50 years.
When provincial lawmakers caught wind of the project after construction was already underway, some were aghast.
Betty Kreitman, a lawmaker in Neuquén at the time, said she was outraged that the Chinese military was being allowed to set up a base on Argentine soil.
“Surrendering sovereignty in your own country is shameful,” Ms. Kreitman said.
When she visited the construction site, she said, she pressed Chinese officials for answers but walked away feeling even more concerned.
“This is a window to the world,” she recalled the Chinese supervisor at the site saying.
“It gave me chills. What do you do with a window to the world? Spy on reality.”

Workers at a housing site in Bajada del Agrio, the closest town to the space station. “People see it as a military base,” one local said.

Rapid Growth, and Then Peril
The pitch was certainly not subtle, but then, it was never meant to be.
China’s policy document on Latin America in 2008 promised governments in the region to “treat each other as equals,” a clear reference to the asymmetric relationship between the United States and its neighbors in the hemisphere.
As “our relationship with the United States diminished, our relationship with China grew,” said Brazil’s former president, Dilma Rousseff, whose ties with the Obama administration suffered after revelations that American officials had spied on her, her inner circle and Brazil’s state-controlled oil company.
“We never felt that China had imperial designs on us.”
The new alliance paid off, helping propel Latin America to the kind of growth rates that Europe and the United States envied.
“Latin America won the China lottery,” said Kevin P. Gallagher, an economist at Boston University. “It helped the region have its largest growth spurt since the 1970s.”
Yet, Mr. Gallagher said, the bounty came with significant peril.
Industries like agriculture and mining are subject to the boom-and-bust cycles of commodity prices, which made relying on them too heavily a big gamble over the long term.
Sure enough, global commodity prices eventually tumbled.
In July 2014, as several leftist leaders were presiding over distressed economies, China signaled even more ambitious plans for the region.
At a summit meeting in Brazil, Xi Jinping announced that Beijing aspired to raise annual trade with the region to $500 billion within a decade.
In an interview with journalists, Xi hailed the trust his government had built in Latin America by quoting a Chinese proverb: “A bosom buddy afar brings distant lands near.”
For emphasis, he quoted the Cuban national hero José Martí and the Brazilian author Paulo Coelho, and recited a line from the epic Argentine poem “Martín Fierro” by José Hernández: “Brothers be united because that is the first law.”
Soon, China took a step that startled the Pentagon.
In October 2015, China’s Defense Ministry hosted officials from 11 countries in Latin America for a 10-day forum on military logistics titled “Strengthening Mutual Understanding for Win-Win Cooperation.”
The meeting built on the ties China had been making with militaries in Latin America, including donating equipment to the Colombian military, Washington’s closest partner in the region.
Borrowing from the playbook the United States had used across the world, China organized joint training exercises, including unprecedented naval missions off the Brazilian coast in 2013 and the Chilean coast in 2014. 
Beijing has also invited a growing number of midcareer military officers from Latin America for career development in China.
The contacts have paved the way for China to start selling military equipment in Latin America, which had long regarded the United States defense industry as the gold standard, said Mr. Ellis, the War College scholar.
Venezuela has spent hundreds of millions on Chinese arms and matériel in recent years. 
Bolivia has bought tens of millions of dollars’ worth of Chinese aircraft. 
Argentina and Peru have signed smaller deals.
Mr. Ellis said the Chinese had also probably pursued cooperation relationships with Latin American nations, with an eye toward any possible confrontation with the United States.
“China is positioning itself in a world that is safe for the rise of China,” he said.
“If you’re talking about the 2049 world, from the perspective of Latin America, China will have unquestionably surpassed the United States on absolute power and size. Frankly, if it was a matter of sustained conflict, you reach a point where you can’t deny the possibility of Chinese forces operating from bases in the region.”
Just weeks after the space station began operating in Patagonia, the United States made an announcement that raised eyebrows here in Argentina.
The Pentagon is funding a $1.3 million emergency response center in Neuquén — the same province where the Chinese base is, and the first such American project in all of Argentina.
Local officials and residents wondered whether the move was a tit-for-tat response to China’s new presence in this remote part of the country.
American officials said that the project was unrelated to the space station, and that the center would be staffed only by Argentines.

Chinese espionage: Lily Huang, 28, right, from China, works at the Argen-Chino supermarket in the town of Las Lajas, about 37 miles south of the Chinese space station.

No Need for New ‘Imperial Powers’
Latin America experts in the Obama White House watched China’s rise in the region warily.
But the administration raised little fuss publicly, sharing its concerns with leaders mostly in private.
Besides, former officials say, Washington did not have much of a counteroffer.
“I wished the whole time I was working in Latin America that any administration had as well thought-out, resourced and planned a policy as the pivot to Asia for Latin America,” said John Feeley, who recently resigned as the American ambassador to Panama after a nearly three-decade career.
“Since the end of the 1980s, there really has never been a comprehensive hemispheric long-term strategy.”
While Barack Obama was widely hailed in the region for restoring diplomatic relations with Cuba in late 2014, Washington’s agenda never ceased being dominated by two issues that have long generated resentment in Latin America: the war on drugs and illegal immigration.
While the Trump administration has yet to articulate a clear policy for the hemisphere, it has warned its neighbors not to get too cozy with China.
Former Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson publicly cautioned that Latin America did not need new “imperial powers,” adding that China “is using its economic statecraft to pull the region into its orbit; the question, is at what price?”
That question is being vigorously debated in some corners.
Former President Rafael Correa of Ecuador was interrogated by prosecutors in February as part of an investigation into whether the decision to promise the country’s crude reserves to China through 2024 harmed national interests.
In Bolivia, which has also seen a surge of Chinese investment, several industries have withered as Chinese products have become cheaper and easier to buy, said Samuel Doria Medina, a Bolivian businessman and politician who has run unsuccessfully against President Evo Morales three times.
“Our financial, commercial and, ultimately, political dependency keeps growing,” Mr. Doria said. Bolivia and several other leftist leaders who have tied their lot to China, he warned, have “mortgaged the future” of their nations.
Yet China’s influence has not diminished, even as Latin America shifts to the right politically.
In recent months, Beijing persuaded Panama and the Dominican Republic to sever ties with Taiwan, notable victories in one of China’s foreign policy priorities.
China’s clout, analyst say, is also a sign of how much the Trump administration has alienated governments in the region by adopting harsh immigration policies and pursuing hardball tactics on trade in a part of the world where Washington already has an ample surplus.
Jorge Arbache, the secretary for international affairs at Brazil’s Planning Ministry, said Washington’s “lack of predictability” had prevented a more ambitious partnership from taking root, while China had been far clearer about its vision.
“Everyone expects China to become even more influential,” Mr. Arbache said.
Residents enjoying a street violinist at dusk in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Belgrano, where Chinese residents are concentrated.

‘People Are Afraid’
Soon after being nominated as Argentina’s ambassador to China in late 2015, Mr. Guelar said, he steeled himself for an arduous task: pushing to renegotiate the space station agreement.
The former government, he said, had given away too much, recklessly failing to specify that the base could be used only for peaceful purposes.
“It was very serious,” he said.
“At any moment it could become a military base.”To his surprise, he said, the Chinese agreed to the use base solely for civilian purposes.
But that did not assuage concerns in Bajada del Agrio, the closest town to the station, where residents speak of the Chinese presence with a mix of bewilderment and fear.
“People see it as a military base,” said Jara María Albertina, the manager at the local radio station. “People are afraid.”
The mayor, Ricardo Fabián Esparza, said the Chinese had been friendly and even invited him to look at the images the antenna produces.
But he is more apprehensive than hopeful.
“From that telescope, they probably can even see what underwear you’re wearing,” he said.
The United States is the one that should be most concerned, he said. 
The base, he said, is an “eye looking toward that country.”

The antenna is the centerpiece of a $50 million station built by the Chinese military.

China Threat

San Francisco is a nirvana for China's main intelligence agency — and the center of an intensifying spy war
By John Haltiwanger
Chinese see San Francisco and Silicon Valley as top priorities in terms of economic and cyber espionage.

• San Francisco and Silicon Valley are top priorities for Beijing's efforts to steal US trade and technological secrets.
• California is the only state where China's main intelligence agency has a dedicated unit focused on political intelligence and influence operations.
• Tech firms — even those with high-level government contracts — are unprepared to respond to espionage and have few incentives to report such activities.

San Francisco and Silicon Valley are top targets for China's main intelligence agency and Beijing's efforts to steal billion of dollars in US trade and technological secrets are only set to increase, according to a new report from Politico .
The intelligence offensive being launched and led by China could also signal how it intends to operate in other US states and countries in the years to come, the Politico report states.
The national conversation regarding espionage might be dominated by discussions of Russian election interference, which is certainly a serious threat, but China's activities out West are reportedly becoming more and more sophisticated.
Russia and even US allies, such as South Korea and Israel, are also quite active in the region.
But it's China's Ministry of State Security (MSS), the country's primary intelligence agency, that has placed particular emphasis on California.

China is dedicating a lot of attention to spying in California
According to the Politico report, California is the only state where the MSS has a dedicated unit focused on political intelligence and influence operations.
This is linked to the fact there are a significant number of influential Chinese immigrants and a large population of Chinese-Americans in the area, and MSS sees potential for recruiting local officials who might be able to move up the political latter.
Chinese officials also pressure Chinese nationals based in California into helping them gather intelligence on tech companies by using their family members back home as leverage or threatening students with a loss of government funding. 

The Chinese government also does this with US citizens who still have family in China.
Tech firms -- even those with high-level government contracts -- are also apparently unprepared to respond to espionage and have few incentives to report such activities, according to the Politico report. 

This is linked to the fact the local communities are quite liberal and the companies might fear being accused of profiling if they singled out Chinese employees.
There have also situations in which employees of tech companies have sold information to the Chinese or Russian governments and the executives decided not to pursue charges because they didn't want their stockholders or investors to know. 

In short, the tech companies would rather avoid the bad press than see employees face legal repercussions for espionage.
In this context, one former US official reportedly told Politico that San Francisco is like a "nirvana" for MSS.

'They have all the time in the world, and all the patience in the world'
Kathleen Puckett, who worked counterintelligence in the Bay Area from 1979 to 2007, told Politico, "The Chinese just have vast resources."
"They have all the time in the world, and all the patience in the world," Puckett added. 

"Which is what you need more than anything."
These sentiments were echoed by FBI Director Christopher Wray at the Aspen Security Forum last week.
"China from a counterintelligence perspective represents the broadest, most pervasive, most threatening challenge we face as a country," Wray said. 

The FBI director has consistently warned of China's efforts in this regard.
Similarly, a government report released on Thursday warned China, Russia, and Iran are ramping up cyber espionage efforts in the US and pose a "significant threat to America's prosperity."
"Foreign economic and industrial espionage against the United States continues to represent a significant threat to America's prosperity, security and competitive advantage," the National Counterintelligence and Security Center said. 

"China, Russia and Iran stand out as three of the most capable and active cyber actors tied to economic espionage and the potential theft of US trade secrets and proprietary information."

U.S. Tech Executioners

How U.S. tech powers China's surveillance state

By Erica Pandey

American companies eager to enter China’s massive market brace themselves for potential intellectual property theft or forced technology transfers. 

But there’s another threat at play: their technology is being used for surveillance.
The big picture: China has sophisticated systems of state surveillance, and these systems have long been powered by technologies developed by American companies. 

Beijing has used U.S. tech to surveil its citizens, violate human rights and modernize its military.

The entanglement
Companies doing business in China often get caught in a web: Beijing uses its economic leverage to draw them in and then uses their technology for police-state tactics. 

As a result, "American companies are enabling and complicit in major human rights abuses," says Elsa Kania, a technology and national security expert at the Center for a New American Security.
Another concern is American universities and research institutions partnering with Chinese companies that work with state security, she says.
Thermo Fisher Scientific, a Massachusetts company, has supplied the Chinese government with DNA sequencers that it is now using to collect the DNA of ethnic minorities in East Turkestan, Human Rights Watch reports. 

At a Thursday hearing, Sen. Marco Rubio called Thermo Fisher's operations in East Turkestan "sick."
iFlyTek is a Chinese company that recently launched a 5-year partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

Beijing has used iFlytek’s voice recognition technology "to develop a pilot surveillance system that can automatically identify targeted voices in phone conversations," according to Human Rights Watch.
Cisco, in 2011, participated in a Chinese public safety project that set up 500,000 cameras in Chongqing, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Yahoo, in 2005, gave the personal information of a Chinese journalist to China's government. 

That information was used to put the man in jail.
Tech giants, like Facebook, Apple and LinkedIn, have faced scrutiny in the past for censoring or offering to censor content in China.
"Not all of these companies realize the extent to which their activities could be exploited," Kania says.
Companies often take on projects for the Chinese government in the name of curbing "crime", according to Scott Kennedy of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, but "the boundary between promoting public safety and protecting the state is increasingly blurred with these types of technologies."

The other side: Axios reached out to all of the companies listed above. 

The responses we received by deadline:
Thermo Fisher Scientific: "We work with governments to contribute to good global policy."
Cisco said it "has never custom-tailored our products for any market, and the products that we sell in China are the same products we sell everywhere else."
Oath, which now owns Yahoo: “We’re deeply committed to protecting and advocating for the rights to free expression and privacy of our users around the world."
LinkedIn: "In order to create value for our members in China and around the world, we need to implement the Chinese government’s restrictions on content, when and to the extent required."

The stakes
"A lot of people wanted very much to believe that once China had exposure to the outside world, political liberalization would come with economic liberalization," Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, tells Axios. 

"They're getting a lot richer and a lot more powerful and no more politically liberal."

What's next:
Some companies have pulled out of China of their own accord in the past. 

Google refused to censor its search engine in China in 2010, leading to its ouster from the country. Other companies may follow suit if they realize their technology is being misused, says Kania.
If companies cannot be held accountable by internal ethics guidelines, shareholders or users, the government may need to step in through export controls or limits on funding to researchers that collaborate with China, she says.
Worth noting: There's already a U.S. law that prohibits the export of crime-control products to China, but the sale of cameras and other dual use technologies that could be used for surveillance are not banned, reports the Wall Street Journal.

China Got “The Rest” Wrong

Beijing is wrong to think other countries will roll over when confronted.

by Huong Le Thu

There is an argument that the West got China wrong. 

It argues that the assumption that China’s economic opening would lead to its political liberalization and transformation into a “ responsible stakeholder ” was incorrect. 

In fact, American policy advisors even concluded that basing Washington’s policy towards China on these assumptions has been a failure . 

China is a country that not only has taken advantage of the rules-based world order but also one that got away with it abusing it.

China has grown into a monstrous economic power that is not constrained by the global rules, but instead is a “ ruthless stakeholder .”
Indeed, China is providing more and more evidence that it is not willing to abide by international law and does not hesitate to act unilaterally in matters it considers critical for its interests—such as in the South China Sea. 

Beijing’s four-no’s strategy to ignore the Arbitral Tribunal ruling from 2016—no participation, no acceptance, no recognition and no enforcement—remains one of most striking examples of open disregard for the rules-based international order. 

China's ability to shake the current order is hard to deny, but it has not necessarily reached its desired position and still is at risk of a stronger push-back from other countries.
China’s military activities in the South China Sea are not only a concern for its direct neighbors and claimants in the disputed waters; they present high risks and unwelcomed tensions to an already unstable region. 

Despite earlier assurances from China that it is not militarizing the artificial islands built in the South China Sea, the continued show of force undermines Beijing’s credibility and peaceful intentions. Military build-ups and actions have also become more prominent in the Taiwan Strait, where recently Beijing conducted war games . 

The question is why is Beijing risking its reputation, and potentially even confrontation, instead of asserting its global position peacefully?
Xi Jinping’s China is ambitious not only in laying out its strategic vision of a new order, but also in racing against time to implement that vision. 

That dream has many facets well beyond militarising artificial islands in the South China Sea. 

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) involves building ports in places ranging from Africa’s Djibouti to wharves in Vanuatu in the Pacific. 

China’s BRI also includes securing access to sea and land-routes globally—from the Arctic to Latin America—as well as proposing new global institutions such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). 

These are all elements of a unified plan for the extension of China’s global reach . 

Finally, all of these massive and potentially game-changing projects are seen as Xi Jinping’s flagship initiatives.
Beijing's strategy to attain dominance has been primarily based on two key components. 

The first is incrementally asserting its territorial claims, even if doing so often includes open disregard for the rule of law. 

The second is offering economic inducements for states to play ball while forging close relationships with key political and business leaders, often with financial incentives.
By many accounts, China's aggressive tactics in the South China Sea seem to have been successful, by both effectively undermining the rules-based order while continuing to expand the range of its Beijing's operations. 

Whether the international community will respond stronger to China's growing arrogance remains a question, but one thing is sure—while the international community keeps pondering, Beijing has managed to gain the time necessary to further its military plans.
Another issue that concerns more actors globally is China's economic statecraft. 

Initially, the BRI projects have been hailed as both the most significant change in global history and China’s gift to the world. 

In fact, many enjoyed the excitement of the new economic and transportation infrastructure opportunities that Chinese initiatives offered. 

Beijing's generosity has been well received, but not without varying levels of reservations about the political implications of Chinese money. 

Furthermore, the global context has helped to strengthen this perception. 

For example, the U.S. protectionist agenda, the Europian Union's self-absorption, and Japan's low-profile economy have only boosted the view that China is filling a void in global leadership. 

After all, China's global projects of the BRI and the AIIB gained the support of even those who had ongoing territorial disputes with China, including India, Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines.
Yet, the Belt and Road Initiative—perhaps the most anticipated project among the developing economies—has become a subject of skepticism and scrutiny. 

For instance, debt traps and compromised national strategic assets have become the most feared outcomes of the BRI. 

Furthermore, Sri Lanka's case of its ill-fated Hambantota Port remains the poster-warning for many. Sri Lanka's $1 billion in Chinese loans were used as leverage to give Bejing a controlling interest in, and ninety-nine-year lease over, the Hambantota Port. 

As a result, the perception that Chinese aid and loans are a trap is spreading around the South Pacific islands.
Also, something has changed over the past months, and there is a growing wave of push-back from around the globe led by "natural rivals," too-close-to-comfort neighbors, and even more distant countries. 

Concerns have also been voiced by countries who have no geographical security concerns vis-à-vis China, like New Zealand or the Czech Republic . 

While the scale and intensity of push-back vary, one concern is universal—that Chinese economic initiatives translate too directly into the capacity to extort political influence over the recipient country. 

For example, to some degree, most Chinese preferences have been incrementally met over the years through international support for Beijing and silence on its taboo topics such as Taiwan, Tibet and human rights. 

But China's political influence now exceeds many other countries' levels of tolerance—particularly given Bejing's influence includes meddling with economic partners' domestic politics.
In Australia, for example, there is an ongoing debate over Chinese influence. 

This includes Four Corners, a report released in June 2017, which exposed the personal connections of Chinese-born business people, not only with Australian politicians but also with high ranking UN officials. 

In America, concerns are stronger over Russian meddling into U.S. domestic politics, but the Chinese presence at universities is also a matter of a widespread discomfort. 

Reports show that the Chinese Community Party has been setting up ‘cells’ at the University of Illinois, while the Chinese Students Scholars Associations (CSSAs) across the country have been distributing money for activities and engagement praising the Chinese government. 

Elsewhere, in Central Europe, the concern about Chinese state influence is not a distant concept either. 

A website, called Chinfluence, collects the cases of Chinese political and economic influence in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.
China's fast-lane to global influence has been pursued through the exploitation of that most common of human weaknesses—greed and fear. 

Aiming at the top leadership and by-passing lengthy processes through corruption has proved effective for Bejing. 

But only for short-term and in certain countries.
Seeking to influence politicians is rather costly and can be only useful in the short term. 

In democratic countries, the political mandate is comparatively short, although former politicians can remain influential and high profile public voices. 

In the case of Australia, former Labour Senator Sam Dastyari demonstrates China’s attempts to cultivate influence and how it could backfire. 

Financial donations from an Australian-Chinese businessman, combined with public statements that seemed to echo the Chinese state’s line on the South China Sea, brought about the end of Dastyari’s political career. 

It also fuelled an ongoing debate over legislative changes relating to foreign interference and foreign donations.
Malaysia’s May general election, which overthrew Najib Razak and over sixty years of his party’s rule also shows the risks for China in building relationships with selected individuals. 

China’s top-down mindset dictates its strategy of forging relationships with targeted individuals, which is effective and fast in the short-term, but which fails to build a foundation for long-term. 

In other words, China fails to institutionalize relationships that stretch beyond personal connections with those leaders should they fall or leave office.
Najib Razak of Malaysia, Hun Sen of Cambodia, and Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines all fit into this template. 

So far, only Hun Sen—who has dissolved his opposition party heading to the July elections—has proved the strategy useful. 

In addition, Duterte has proven to be a game-changer in the lawfare in the South China Sea by disregarding the legal victory from the Tribunal Arbitral ruling for the sake of improving relations with Beijing. 

But, as a populist leader, he is also subject to his nation’s swinging mood.
In contrast, China’s relationship with Vietnam is an example of a relationship which does involve a few long-standing and close affinities extending beyond personal benefits. 

Based on a party-to-party relationship, Hanoi and Beijing have developed a history of close ties dating back a couple of decades. 

Yet, instead of nurturing that relationship, Beijing’s rush to assert its position in the South China Sea has pushed its fellow communist regime away. 

In fact, that rift has been to the degree that even though Hanoi is traditionally suspicious of America, Vietnam has invited an American aircraft carrier to visit and is working on strategic partnerships with Washington and its allies. 

Given the size and importance of Vietnam, the costs to the Chinese state in its relationship with Hanoi might seem insignificant in comparison to Beijing’s perceived value of the South China Sea claims. 

But souring the relationship with Vietnam—including recently preventing it from conducting oil and gas explorations or China’s dispatching of long-range bombers to the Paracels—is hurting its relationships by stirring up the otherwise relatively pacified periphery.
Trump’s erratic leadership in global affairs does provide a strategic opportunity for China to fill that gap. 

Xi Jinping is astute in seizing this opportunity. 

In fact, China would be welcome to fill in the global leadership void on many critical issues, such as climate change, trade and infrastructure development. 

But while Xi’s vision of a “community of common destiny” is attractive in various ways for many economies around the world, China's execution of the vision invokes increasing unease, including among those who do not have strategic connections with Beijing. 

China's grand plans to achieve national rejuvenation by 2049 sounds impressive, but the tactics it applies are creating tensions. 

Xi Jinping's ambitious and impatient strategy of assertion is insensitive to fellow "common community" members' values, interests and needs. 

Additionally, it is a missed opportunity for global leadership and contradicts the rhetoric of international harmony and ‘win-win' behavior. 

Leaders supporting Beijing are also driven by the pursuit of immediate gains, seeking economic benefits rather than long-term common beliefs and solidarity. 

China is doubling down on a costly strategy of buying "followers" rather than winning the hearts and minds of friends and partners. 

This is neither an effective nor an efficient strategy.