Lieutenant-General Wang Hongguang blasts PLA pundits’ “interference” in decisions and deployments
Posted: April 29, 2013 Filed under: China-Japan, Diaoyu, Global Times, PLA & PLAN | Tags: Chinese army propaganda, Chinese foreign policy, Chinese media, Chinese military, Chinese nationalism, Dai Xu, Diaoyu Islands, fire control radar, General Liu Yuan, Huanqiu, Huanqiu Shibao, Luo Yuan, Peng Guangqian, PLA, propaganda, radar incident, Senkaku, Wang Hongguang, Xi Jinping, Zhang Zhaozhong 1 Comment »
Increase vigilance: the reasonable conclusion of PLA pundits like Dai Xu?
[I spent hours on this post, then WordPress kindly lost it without a trace, hence this is a bit out-of-date, sorry]
The April 20 edition of the Huanqiu Shibao (Global Times) carried an article by recently-retired PLA Lieutenant-General Wang Hongguang, directly criticizing the Chinese media’s hawkish military commentators.
The article is brief — indeed so brief that the obligatory preface declaring support for the pundits’ patriotic mission does not even run to a full sentence:
In recent years, military affairs experts have frequently appeared on TV and in all kinds of publications, with the positive effect of strengthening the masses’ national defense awareness and arousing patriotism, but it cannot be denied that some have said off-key things, things that have misled the audience and been irresponsible.
Lt-Gen Wang, who now serves as Vice President of the PLA’s Academy of Military Science, made it quite clear that by “military affairs experts” he was referring to fellow PLA academics, particularly Zhang Zhaozhong, Luo Yuan, and of course Dai Xu.
It’s unusual to hear a PLA academic criticize his comrades in public; even more so for someone of such high rank. But most remarkable was Lt-Gen Wang’s claim that PLA academics’ war talk is “interfering” with the CCP-PLA leadership’s decision-making, citing the specific example of Sino-Japanese relations:
Some experts have inappropriately made comparisons of China and Japan’s military strength, claiming “China and Japan will inevitably go to war”, and that this “would not significantly affect our period of strategic opportunity”, [thus] inciting public sentiment and causing some interference with our high-level policy decision-making and deployments.
Wang Hongguang is in a position to know. Until recently he was Deputy Commander of the PLA’s Nanjing Military Region.
Abe’s Southeast Asian Diplomacy: intersection of the South and East China Sea disputes
Posted: February 25, 2013 Filed under: China-Japan, China-Philippines, China-Vietnam, Diaoyu, People's Daily | Tags: Diaoyu Islands, diplomacy, East China Sea, Global Times, Japan-ASEAN, Japan-Philippines, Japan-US, Japan-Vietnam, Malaysia and South china SEa, Nguyen Tan Dung, People's Daily, Shinzo Abe, Sino-Japanese relations, south china sea, Truong Tan Sang, Vietnam, Vietnam-Japan, Zhong Sheng Leave a comment »
Japanese & Vietnamese Prime Ministers Nguyen Tan Dung and Shinzo Abe on January 16 in Hanoi
This post was originally published on the China Policy Institute Blog:
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Between January 10 and 19 this year, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida paid formal bilateral visits to the Philippines, Singapore, Brunei, Australia, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia: seven countries in the space of 10 days. The diplomatic blitz illustrates the intersection of the East and South China Sea disputes, and the impetus this has given to Japan’s policy of deepening regional engagement since the early 2000s.
Six of Abe and Kishida’s seven destination countries were ASEAN member states, and three of them were parties to the South China Sea disputes. In fact, Taiwan aside, the only non-PRC South China Sea claimant state that Japan’s leaders did not visit was Malaysia, which continues to quietly extract hydrocarbons and develop tourism in the disputed area with little hindrance, thanks to its steadfast determination to avoid antagonizing Beijing.
Abe had actually wanted Washington to be his first destination after taking office, in line with his publicly stated intention to strengthen ties with the US, but Barack Obama was too busy to host a January summit. The hasty arrangement of Abe’s jaunt through Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia — he set out on January 16, only nine days after being told Obama’s schedule was full – seems to suggest receptiveness to Japan’s advances in major ASEAN capitals.
Not surprisingly, the Philippines and Vietnam were the most openly enthusiastic about the Japanese leaders’ visits. Kishida arrived in Manila on January 9, exactly one month after Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario told the Western media the Philippines would “very much” welcome a rearmed Japan free from pacifist constitutional constraints. This time Del Rosario took the opportunity to denounce the PRC’s South China Sea policy in probably the strongest terms yet seen from a serving minister, telling reporters after the meeting that the China was engaging in “very threatening” behaviour: “We do have this threat and this threat is shared by many countries not just by Japan.”
If the rhetoric sounded highly-strung, it was almost matched by the two countries’ actual actions. Del Rosario said Kishida had brought with him an offer of 10 brand-new patrol boats for the Philippines Coast Guard, later confirmed to be supplied under Japan’s Official Development Aid program. To put that in context, the Philippines Coast Guard only has 15 ships currently in service, plus 5 on order from France, so Japan is single-handedly increasing the PCG’s ship numbers by more than 30%.
Radar Incident Obscures Beijing’s Conciliatory Turn toward Japan
Posted: February 18, 2013 Filed under: China-Japan, CMS (China Maritime Surveillance), Diaoyu, Global Times, PLA & PLAN, TV | Tags: CCTV, 环球时报, Diaoyu Islands, diplomacy, fire control radar, General Liu Yuan, Global Times, Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force, Natsuo Yamaguchi, PLA General Logistics Department, radar incident, Senkaku Islands, Sino-Japanese relations, 刘源 7 Comments »
As seen on TV…well, not quite but almost
Apologies to anyone who may have visited in hope of new material in the past few weeks. This year I need to write a PhD dissertation so posts will be even more sporadic than usual. There are a number of unfinished ones in the pipeline that I really hope to get around to completing at some point, and I will try to also post some of the summary translations of significant PRC media articles and comment threads that I normally keep to myself.
What follows is a piece I wrote for the Jamestown Foundation’s China Brief which came out last Friday: Radar Incident Obscures Beijing’s Conciliatory Turn. This version here has the addition of links to the sources at the end.
Also, since there are no comments on the Jamestown website, I encourage anyone who wants to discuss to leave comments here on this post.
Thank you for tuning in and making this blog such a temptation to write on.
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Radar Incident Obscures Beijing’s Conciliatory Turn Towards Japan
February 15, 2013
On February 5, Japanese Defense Minister Onodera Itsunori told the world that a Chinese Navy frigate had pointed “something like fire-control radar” at a Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force (MSDF) destroyer some 100-150 kilometers north of the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands on January 30. He said the same may have happened to a MSDF helicopter on January 19, though this remained unverified (Daily Yomiuri, February 7; Sydney Morning Herald, February 7).
This marked the first direct involvement of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy ships in the ongoing confrontations around the islands since Japan’s government purchased three of them from a private Japanese owner on September 10 last year. Accordingly, much reportage and analysis has characterized this as part of an ongoing series of escalatory Chinese actions in the East China Sea. Yet the radar incidents ran counter to a distinctly conciliatory trend since mid-January in China’s official rhetoric, diplomatic action, media discourse and even maritime activities.
“Evacuate all Chinese people from Japan”: warning shots in the East China Sea, or just media war?
Posted: January 15, 2013 Filed under: China-Japan, Diaoyu, Global Times, PRC News Portals | Tags: CCTV, Chinese media, Chinese public opinion, Diaoyu, Global Times, Huanqiu, media effects, PLA Air Force, PRC foreign policy, Senkaku, Sino-Japanese relations Leave a comment »
[Updated 16 Jan 3.45pm BST]
On Tuesday afternoon the Chinese online media, led by Huanqiu Wang (Global Times Net), started reporting, “Japan official explicitly states for first time that warning shots will be fired at Chinese planes“.
HQW’s reporter Wang Huan 王欢 quoted the Asahi Shimbun website quoting Defense Minister Onodera, when asked about warning shots, replying that “any country would make this response if its airspace was intruded upon”.
Onodera’s comment may well have been coaxed out of him by reporters looking for a juicy headline, as it comes across as a contradiction of Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga’s comment last week as reported by CNS (the other Xinhua) as reported by CNS that there were no plans for firing warning shots.
According to the Chinese internet media headlines that have relayed the story, Suga “denied” 否认 plans to fire warning shots, but now Onodera has “explicitly confirmed” 明确表态 that they will occur.
The news that Japan “will fire warning shots” was still the top splash on HQW’s website more than 12 hours later:
Whether Onodera’s statement has been reported accurately or not, the result is that the Diaoyu ball game now rests with the PRC, and the party-state is playing on a big-time court with a packed house looking on.
Xi Jinping: a hardline nationalist in control of China?
Posted: December 14, 2012 Filed under: China's foreign relations, China-Japan, CMS (China Maritime Surveillance), Diaoyu | Tags: 18th CCP Congress, China leadership transition, China Maritime Surveillance, Chinese foreign policy, Chinese nationalism, CMS, Diaoyu Islands, great revival, Hu Jintao, PRC foreign policy, PRC maritime law enforcement, PRC-Japan, Senkaku, taoguang yanghui, western media, Xi Jinping, Xi Jinping foreign policy, Xi Jinping nationalism 8 Comments »
April, 2012: Vice President Xi Jinping Meets with the Japanese Association for the Promotion of International Trade Delegation
Last week the New York Times ran a story on how Ling Jihua’s attempt to cover up his son’s death in that Ferrari crash may have severely weakened Hu Jintao’s position during this year’s CCP leadership transition.
It might just be me and my island-centricness, but this story certainly didn’t seem to be following the inverted-pyramid rule, for only those readers who persisted to the very last paragraph (or read the Sinocism China Newsletter) would have learned that:
By September, party insiders said, Mr. Hu was so strained by the Ling affair and the leadership negotiations that he seemed resigned to yielding power. As Mr. Hu’s influence faded, Mr. Xi began taking charge of military affairs, including a group coordinating China’s response to the escalating row with Japan over disputed islands.
Given both the vital role Ling had played in managing the logistics of the General Secretary’s day-to-day activities, and the likely emotional toll of the death of a close associate’s son, this idea of a Human Jintao feeling the pinch is logical enough.
Although the Times‘ sources say Ling’s replacement as CCP General Office Director, Li Zhanshu, arrived in July, the public announcement of Ling’s reassignment from the post was only made on September 1. Then Noda reached his agreement with the Kurihara family to make the purchase on September 4. Could all this explain Xi Jinping’s lack of a public appearance between September 2 and September 12? If i were gearing up to take over as CCP General Secretary in a few months’ time and then found myself taking charge of the country’s response to a rapidly-escalating crisis, i’d have trouble finding time for photo ops.
Consensus at the top? China’s opportunism on Diaoyu and Scarborough Shoal
Posted: November 28, 2012 Filed under: Academic debates, China-ASEAN, China-Malaysia, CMS (China Maritime Surveillance), Diaoyu, FLEC & Ministry of Agriculture | Tags: 1988 Spratly Battle, anti-Japanese protest, ASEAN and South China Sea, China-ASEAN, Chinese foreign policy, Chinese public opinion, COC, Code of Conduct, Diaoyu Islands, escalation, 钓鱼岛, Johnson South Reef Skirmish, nationalism card, PRC foreign policy, PRC maritime law enforcement, PRC-Japan, reactive assertiveness, Scarborough Shoal 黄岩岛, south china sea, uses of public opinion 1 Comment »
“New facts on the water”
In last week’s Sinica Podcast, M. Taylor Fravel discussed the March 1988 Sino-Vietnamese battle in the Spratly Islands, recounting how the PLAN Commander was moved from his post afterwards as a result of his unauthorized decision to open fire on the Vietnamese Navy.
This could make the 1988 battle appear as a historical example of uncoordination in the PRC’s behaviour towards the outside world — a rogue commander taking foreign policy into his own hands. However, the decision to send the Navy in to establish a presence on unoccupied reefs in the Spratlys was a centralized, high-level one.
Today, the Chinese Navy is better equipped and better trained, so the chances of something similar happening are small. The unwavering non-involvement of the PLAN in China’s maritime territorial disputes, even as tensions have risen to boiling point, is a testament to the navy’s professionalization, and a site of consensus among China’s policymakers. The US Department of Defense in 2011 presciently pinpointed (see p.60) the increasing use of non-military law enforcement agencies to press China’s claims in disputed waters as an important component of PRC policy. Since then, this approach has become ever-more salient.
China’s maritime law enforcement fleets have long been seen as a source of policy disorganization, both within China and abroad; back in 2002, for example, the Hainan Provincial NPC delegation tabled a motion to establish a unified maritime law-enforcement fleet.
But in the podcast Fravel drew attention to how this year the China Maritime Surveillance and Fisheries Law Enforcement fleets have actually coordinated rather well, both with each other and with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in advancing China’s maritime claims.
First Luo Yuan, now Liu Yuan: from one “public opinion incident” to another
Posted: March 19, 2013 | Author: southseaconversations | Filed under: China-Japan, Comment threads, Diaoyu, PLA & PLAN, PRC News Portals, Weibo, Xinhua | Tags: Chinese internet, Chinese internet news portals, Chinese public opinion, 罗援少将, Dai Xu, Diaoyu Islands, 钓鱼岛, General Liu Yuan, iFeng, Luo Yuan, Netease, online nationalism, phoenix, PHoenix online, PLA, public opinion, public opinion incident, Senkaku Islands, Sina, Sina weibo, Weibo, 刘源, 戴旭 | 7 Comments »Liu Yuan giving his March 14 interview
…not to be confused with Luo Yuan
Over the past few weeks i’ve counted five instances of PLA General Liu Yuan publicly warning against military conflict with Japan over the Diaoyu Islands. If this puzzled the SCMP’s seasoned reporters, who described Liu as “hawkish” in a story quoting him saying, “The friendship between people in China and Japan is everlasting,” it was positively shocking for many the Chinese internet’s e-nationalists. [1]
Actual serving General Liu Yuan is not to be confused with retired academic “Major-General” Luo Yuan (i’ll continue to put his rank in quotes to distinguish them), who was dumped from the CPPCC this month for being “too outspoken”.
That rationale was a bit ironic given he too has been oddly conciliatory on the Diaoyu issue of late. Not only did “Major-General” Luo categorically refute a Japanese media report that he had called for Tokyo to be bombed, he also seemed to deny he had ever suggested establishing a military presence on Diaoyu. And in one of his earliest Weibos, Luo raised a historical episode that seemed to imply that the US could secretly be trying to fool China into giving it a rationale for military intervention over Diaoyu:
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