Alexandra Lieben 0:03

Good morning. Good afternoon, everyone, wherever you are in the world. Welcome to today's event. Our talk with Peter Martin about his new book, China's Civilian Army: The Making of Wolf Warrior Diplomacy. It's a fascinating book, you will really enjoy the talk and our conversation afterwards. My name is Alexandra Lieben, I'm the Deputy Director of the Burkle Center for International Relations. I'm stepping in for Kal Raustiala today who is indisposed. And just to say a quick word about our co sponsors. The event today's co sponsored by the Asia Pacific Center, the Center for Chinese Studies and the Department of Public Policy here at UCLA. It is also part of International Education Week. Peter Martin, we're very glad to have him. He's Bloomberg defense policy and intelligence reporter in Washington, DC, the author of the book you're about to hear about, and he was previously based in Beijing, China, where he wrote about the escalating tensions between the US and China so really knows what he's talking about. And was also stationed is like, also reported from the border of China and North Korea. So that's also really interesting aspect, actually speaking about the dynamics and sort of psychology of the region, and its as it relates to the world. And his writing, Peter has written in many different publications. He's been published in Foreign Affairs, in Foreign Policy, in the Atlantic, in The Guardian, and other publications. We're very glad to have him. Thank you very much beautiful giving us your time, for joining us today. And we look forward to your remarks right now. And also for the audience quickly, as always, we are recording this talk today. You can find it on YouTube, and on our website for questions, because Peter's going to talk for about 20 minutes, then we'll have a brief conversation, and then we open it up for q&a with all of you. Please post your questions in the q&a portal. We will also post a link to Peter's book, there is a discount code if you want to order it from the publisher itself. And we post that in the chat. Okay, so turning it over to Peter, welcome.

Peter Martin 2:16

Well, thank you so much for the warm welcome. It's really a pleasure to be doing this. So I thought I would talk a little bit about, you know, how I came to write the book. And then, and then some of the key findings. And I'm glad we're gonna have time for back and forth and q&a, because I think that's, that's always the most enjoyable part of, of doing these things. And so, I arrived back in China in 2017, after a few years away, living in Delhi, and then in Washington. And, you know, I was immediately struck, naturally enough by the the incredible progress that China had made during that time. You know, China's economy was beating estimates. Xi Jinping was rolling out this ambitious Belt and Road Initiative across the world. The Chinese military was rolling out China's first overseas military base in Djibouti, militarizing artificial islands in the South China Sea. So a country's hard power seemed to be going from strength to strength. And there was also this extraordinary opportunity ahead of China in the shape of the Trump administration, which was busy picking fights with US allies, you know, criticizing multilateral institutions. And it seemed for a moment that there was this real opening for China to kind of step up and take on a greater leadership role. But the longer I spent in Beijing, and the more I kind of observed Chinese foreign affairs rollout, the clearer it became that for whatever reason, while China was incredibly effective at using its hard power, you know, mustering inducements, economic inducements to get others to follow its wishes or coercive measures to prevent others from acting in ways they didn't like, for whatever reason, it seemed to be unable to kind of step up and persuade others of its intentions, persuade others to follow its lead. And I started to kind of think about why that was and why it matters. And I guess when you step back, and you think about the kind of world that we're moving into, this is going to be a world where there are multiple competing centers of power. And there's going to be a real premium on the ability to persuade others to communicate to get your point of view across and countries that can't do that, I think will struggle to emerge as the true leaders. And the more I kind of looked at this problem and this this struggle that that China had to get its views across the more I kind of came to see Chinese diplomats as a microcosm of that broader difficulty. And you could see it even on a personal level when you interacted with them. So, you know, one on one, Chinese diplomats can be suave, funny, they have degrees from fancy universities like Georgetown, the London School of Economics, they speak multiple foreign languages, spent decades living overseas. And yet, when they stand up on the podium in the foreign ministry to do press conferences, or they sit down opposite their US counterparts and counterparts from across the world, suddenly they become quite stilted, rigid, ideological, and, of course, in recent years, also increasingly aggressive. And so I got curious about the roots of this behavior, and started to, you know, do interviews, of course, in Beijing, speaking to Chinese diplomats speaking to foreign diplomats about their experiences, but also to look for a body of sources in Chinese, which might help me to understand it. And I came across this collection of memoirs by former Chinese diplomats, more than 100 of them in total. And you know that they're pretty dense, often, often kind of painfully boring books. But hidden among these memoirs are little details which illuminate China's struggle to communicate with the world and what it's like to be on the frontlines of Chinese foreign policy. So I decided to take that collection of texts and to use it as the source base for my book. And you know, I'll be honest, when I started out, this was a pretty niche and geeky topic. That didn't stop me because I'm a pretty niche and geeky person. But if any of you have been following this closely, you'll have realized that it's become very, very mainstream in recent years. We've seen an explosion of kind of aggressive and high profile outbursts by Chinese diplomats across the world. We've seen Chinese diplomats storming out of international meetings, telling foreign counterparts to shut up, spreading disinformation, and even conspiracy theories on the origins of COVID-19. And, you know, you just have to look at the confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill earlier this year. And you'll have seen, you know, from the CIA to the State Department to the Department of Defense, that this has become really front and center of the way that the US government now thinks of the China challenge and indeed the way that US allies think about China's intentions. But, but what was really clear to me after spending all of this time with these memoirs, was that while what's now known as wolf warrior diplomacy seems very new on the surface, actually, its roots go back a very, very long way. So so when the People's Republic of China was founded in 1949, China basically had no diplomats to speak of. Its leaders face a really kind of paradoxical challenge. On the one hand, this was a highly paranoid, secretive political party, the Communist Party, which had just won power in the Chinese Revolution, and it had spent decades hiding underground conducting this covert armed struggle against its enemies. And suddenly, it burst out onto the international stage and needed to win friends and establish itself as the legitimate government of China. And so to kind of square that circle that need to maintain secrecy and, and paranoia about the outside world with the need to win over international respect, the PRC's first foreign minister Zhou Enlai came up with this approach to diplomacy, but he said that Chinese diplomats should think and act like the People's Liberation Army in civilian clothing. In other words, they should emulate the fighting force which had just propelled the Communist Party to power. And what he meant by that was that Chinese diplomats would be unfailingly loyal to the Communist Party. They will be disciplined to a fault and they would display what he called the fighting spirit as they protected China's interests across the world. And so this kind of martial militaristic ethos resulted in a bunch of really distinctive behaviors, which were visible in 1949 and remain visible 'till today, you know, regarding in spite of all of the extraordinary changes that China has, has gone through over the years. So Chinese diplomats will typically stick incredibly closely to talking points. Even if they know that those talking points don't resonate with people across the table. They will move around in pairs to keep tabs on each other, and make sure that no secret information is leaked. They will sometimes shout at foreign counterparts when they're concerned or worried about failing to look tough enough back home. And they'll elevate even the smallest of perceived slights or insults into major international incidents, because they worry that if they don't, they'll be judged as disloyal by people back in Beijing. And so, this this kind of approach led to displays of what we would now call wolf warrior diplomacy right from the outset. So in 1950, this this veteran revolutionary named Wusil Tren who had a bullet mark across his cheek had spent decades fighting Communist Party enemies across the country. He led a delegation to the United Nations in New York, and delivered a speech which frankly, makes the day's wolf warriors look like a bunch of wimps. Time Magazine described it at the time as two awful hours of rasping vituperation, which gives you a sense of the mood in the room. And in the 1960s, Chinese diplomats clashed on the streets with protesters outside the Chinese Embassy in London, one of them was pictured wielding an axe in London. Chinese diplomats were expelled from countries ranging from Indonesia to Kenya and handing out red books on the streets of foreign capitals. But while that wolf warrior kind of approach has been with us for a long time, it's really important to keep it in the context of an alternate tradition in Chinese diplomacy, which is this need to win friends and build influence. And so other times Chinese diplomats have been capable of mustering that extraordinary discipline that I talked about earlier, and using it to see charm offensives across the world. So in the 1950s, China did that to great effect with developing countries, as it sought to branch out from the Soviet Bloc, and to win friends across Asia and Africa. And in the 1990s, in the aftermath of the Tiananmen massacre, Chinese diplomats spearheaded an incredibly effective, kind of two decade charm offensive, which blunted much of the international criticism against China, and ultimately culminated in it hosting the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing. So I kind of think of that being two tendencies which we've cycled in and out over time. There's a tendency to charm the world. And there's a tendency to use wolf warrior tactics to tell the world off. And recently, of course, we've seen a pretty decisive, lurch back toward that kind of combative assertiveness that we saw at times in the 50s and the 60s. And I think that's been driven by two things. I think on the one hand, there's a new competence about China's place in the world. And on the other hand, there are these enduring insecurities, which have been exacerbated by the tenure of current President Xi Jinping. So the new competence started around 2008 and 2009 in the wake of the global financial crisis, when Chinese leaders looked out across the world, and they believe that, you know, Western leaders in the US, but especially in Europe, have kind of been slow and prevaricated in their response to the financial crisis. And they can trust it that with their own ability to launch a massive and very successful stimulus package in the Chinese economy. And they started to kind of think, you know, we've spent all of these years acting so deferentially toward the west and kind of taking it as a model. But now maybe our model is holding up more strongly and perhaps we don't need to show that that kind of difference anymore. And the upshot of that was a couple of years of really quite assertive Chinese diplomacy on the country's periphery, which really became clearer, louder and more consistent after Xi Jinping became a communist party boss in late 2012. And under Xi Jinping, China's political system has become an increasingly tense and even scary place. Xi has instituted a sweeping anti corruption campaign, which has punished more than 1.5 million officials and has used political disloyalty as one measure of corruption. He has abolished presidential term limits, setting himself up as leader for life. And he's used reeducation camps to subdue the far western region of Xinjiang. Xi has focused on ideology at home, and many of his speeches have emphasized hostility towards the outside world and especially to foreign influences in China's cultural and political spheres. And I think it's really important to remember that when when Chinese diplomats see signals like this in domestic politics, they know exactly how to interpret them. So the Foreign Ministry over the decades has has experienced multiple rounds of purges, in which colleagues were, were encouraged to inform on each other. And in the Cultural Revolution, things got so bad that junior Chinese diplomats locked Chinese ambassadors in salads, they forced them to clean toilets, and even beat them until they coughed up blood. Large numbers of Chinese envoys actually were sent off to reeducation camps themselves. And so they know exactly how high the stakes can be for getting on the wrong side of, of China's political system. And I think all of these things kind of came together to set a new tone for Chinese diplomacy. And so when Chinese diplomats heard President Xi talking about how China was moving closer and closer to the center of the world stage, was standing tall in the East, would never tolerate foreign bullying or give up an inch of its territory. And to really center his his domestic politics around the idea that he was going to rejuvenate the Chinese nation. They started to mimic that language in their own communication with the outside. And if they were ambitious, maybe they'd add a little extra zeal just for good measure. And so this this kind of new assertive approach to diplomacy really went into high gear after the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic. China was under attack for its role in the initial outbreak of the pandemic. But it also felt just like in the financial crisis, that his model had been vindicated, because after all, China had been able to stop the spread of COVID 19, as Europe and much of the West, including the US really struggled with that. And the result, I think, was a series of outbursts, which I kind of detailed earlier on, which were apparently cheered on by Xi Jinping, who even issued a handwritten note to the Foreign Ministry calling for more fighting spirit from his diplomats. And this new approach came to be known as wolf warrior diplomacy. And if one figure really came to to epitomize that approach, it was current foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian. Zhao had been this this relatively obscure figure posted to the Chinese Embassy in Islamabad. And he managed to get himself into a Twitter fight with former US National Security Adviser Susan Rice. And, and that resulted in him kind of rocketing to domestic fame in China being appointed spokesman making him one of the most high profile faces of the Chinese government overseas, and when Zhao returned to the Foreign Ministry in Beijing, he was actually greeted outside his office by a small group of young Chinese diplomats who, who applauded his return. Zhao has used that position to offend pretty much everyone who has has come across his path. But most notably, he angered the Australian government when he posted a doctored image of an Australian soldier with a knife to the throat of an Afghan child. And perhaps most dramatically, he angered Donald Trump's Oval Office when he suggested that the US Army had deliberately spread COVID-19 in Wuhan. Although Zhao is a very high profile example, there is actually a whole cast of characters who have kind of followed him in this in this approach. One of them is Gui Congyou, who was China's ambassador until recently in Sweden. Gui was summoned by the Swedish Foreign Ministry 40 times over the space of two years as a result of his provocative behavior. And when Swedish media asked him about his behavior in an interview, he said, for our friends we have fine wine, and for our enemies we have shotguns. So he, you know, he struck a pretty unapologetic tone. And it's it's important, of course, to stress that not every Chinese diplomat likes this approach. And there are there are many scholars and even people inside the Foreign Ministry who disagree with it. So Yuan Nansheng, who was China's former consul general in San Francisco, has warned about the trend toward extreme nationalism in Chinese foreign policy, and said that this could alienate others. And even President Xi himself. In a Politburo study session, earlier this year, talked about the need for China to cultivate a more lovable image around the world, which I think is at least a kind of tacit recognition that China and and China's diplomats have been more frightening than lovable in recent years. But you know, as I said at the outset, anyone who studied this will understand that this this kind of wolf warrior approach, and that kind of combative assertiveness, we've seen recently has been in the foreign ministry's DNA right from the beginning. And so with that, maybe I'll pause here, and then turn it over to q&a. Thank you so much for listening.

Alexandra Lieben 21:41

That was fascinating. Thank you very much for taking us to here. And, starting with the very last thing you said, it's like, here's like the wolf warrior diplomacy emerged, right from communist China trying to assert itself in the world that was that it found is largely hostile towards ideology also. So. So here, we are looking at the legacy of this. And my question is here is like, how do we overcome our history? Right, and sort of our self perception that that lingers here, right. And it's like, and whether it is appropriate or not, like, that's why you see is like, this is interesting combination of, of feeling powerful, and at the same time, and intensly insecure, right, which sort of creates a lot of instability. But here's like, what is what is your thought about this? How could China emerge and see itself differently?

Peter Martin 22:36

Yeah, I mean, I, I think that, you know, some of that is kind of rooted in the country's history and this belief that it's been wronged by, by foreign imperialist powers and that kind of stuff. But a lot of it, and I think maybe even most of it is rooted in the Chinese political system. So it's really hard for me to envision a fundamentally sort of less insecure approach from Chinese diplomats while they still have the Communist Party looking over their shoulders the whole time. And I kind of struggled to see how they could they could address that. But I guess at least there is, no, but if that sets a kind of an upper limit, a glass ceiling on how effective Chinese diplomacy can be, it's still true that over different periods of time, sometimes that system has been more effective, and sometimes it's been less effective. And I think that the real sort of determinant now for whether China can turn it around is the country's perception of the international system, but especially a US power. And at the moment, I think a lot of elites in Beijing think that the US has entered this period of kind of terminal decline. And that, you know, it's it's political system is ineffective, they look at the rise of populism, you know, gridlock in Congress, and, and they kind of think, you know, our system is holding up better than this. And so, even if we're getting criticized, there's not really any need for us to change our minds. And we'll see if the if the Biden administration is actually able to shift that perspective.

Alexandra Lieben 24:24

What's Xi Jinping's idea of a rejuvenated China, what does it look like?

Peter Martin 24:32

Yeah, I mean, he, he has kind of laid it out. He actually calls it the Chinese Dream. But you know, unlike the American Dream, which is very focused on individuals and their, their objectives, Xi's Chinese Dream is all about the strength of the Chinese nation. And actually, Xi has made this idea of strength kind of central to his politics and he said that by 2049, China should be, you know, kind of equal to any other power in the world in terms of its its economic development, its military strength. And so I think it means that, you know, for some people, it means that China will emerge as the preeminent global power. And for the others who were a little bit less ambitious, it means that China will be a full peer competitor of the US, and it will kind of dominate the 21st century as a co equal. So you know, pick whichever one of those you like, but either way, it's pretty ambitious.

Alexandra Lieben 25:37

So what's given, like and people sort of debates like how much? It seems there seems to be consensus that this will be handled on the economic side of things rather than tactical military engagement. Although there is the question of Taiwan. But what is your advice to US foreign policymakers and to the Biden administration's, given what you've written about your experience, being in China talking with so many people, how should they approach China? Right, and like, given the human rights issues, intellectual property, cybersecurity, all of the issues we're dealing with, in addition to economic issues, it's like what? Yeah, so be their consultants, what do you tell them?

Peter Martin 26:21

Yeah, I mean, I'm sure that they don't want to listen to the advice of a random British journalist. But I mean, I guess I guess my my perception from, from having looked at these books, and done these interviews, is that the Chinese government tends to be incredibly responsive to perceptions of the kind of configuration of power in the world around it. And so I think it's really notable that the Biden administration has started off, Jake Sullivan, the National Security Adviser use this phrase where he wants to approach relations with China from a position of strength. And so that means, you know, domestic reforms, build back better infrastructure at home. And it also means strengthening US alliances, so the quad grouping of nations with India, Japan, and Australia, partnerships with NATO, the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, all of these kinds of things. And actually, from based on conversations I've had with people in Beijing, I think that approach is likely to be pretty effective, because there's a strong belief in China, that the kind of the best asset that the US has, is its alliance system. And in this, there's this great fear that China will end up encircled and contained by that alliance system. So I think that an emphasis on that kind of thing is far more likely to be effective than kind of just sitting down with China and explaining that, you know, there's been this long belief, I think, by a lot of us statesmen, that that China was in need of some kind of tutelage from the US. And if only they can sit down with Chinese leaders and explain to them, you know, that they've seen the light and that China too, might see it, that things would be okay. And I think I think we've seen from from kind of example, that actually Chinese leaders focus much more on power.

Alexandra Lieben 28:17

I think that's true. Belt and Road Initiative. Right? I mean, that's, that is a very expansive project. And, and here two is like, I mean, you have sort of that, as we watch it grow, right, whether it's to Africa, through Europe it's like, and, and here also Chinese run into cultural issues, as they sort of expand and carve out their path. But how does that intersect with wolf warrior diplomacy? Right? Like, I mean, you have to basically sell this, you have to sell yourself to these other nations that you propose these cooperations with?

Peter Martin 28:52

Yeah, I mean, I think, I think, you know, although, of course, the Belt and Road Initiative has been criticized for its environmental footprint and for, you know, creating dependencies in other countries, it it actually does represent some of the best strengths of Chinese foreign policy, which is this ability to muster resources from across the Chinese state, in the service of of national security objectives. And that's something that other countries you know, really struggle with. And US presidents will often reach for the military tool most quickly, because that tends to be the tool which is most available to the executive branch. Chinese leaders don't really have those restrictions. And so they can they can look to, to create projects like this without worrying that, you know, the legislature or or some other body will, will get in the way. And so I think that the Belt and Road really represents China's ability to offer inducements and to kind of almost buy soft power and buy acquiescence from the outside world and despite the backlash it's generated, I think that, you know, these are broad brushstrokes. But I think China has come under much less criticism from the developing world because it's it's spotted rightly that there is a huge desire for infrastructure spending, and it's agreed to step up and offer it. You know, the US tends to be a little bit more focused on kind of setting the rules of the road and doing that kind of thing. And I think there's, there's probably a little bit less demand for that from developing world leaders.

Alexandra Lieben 30:33

But at the same time, it's like you also talked about in the book that public view, right, public perception of China, and for example, in European countries, right, also the US is like, is, as with the ascendancy of wolf warrior diplomacy, right, public opinion goes down. So obviously, it's like, I mean, that has an impact. And that's why here too it's sort of straddling that, like the desire to be accepted, the desire to push forward. And at the same time having to manage their public image. And I'm wondering, and you say, there seems to be a recognition now that some of that needs to change, but here to that runs counter Xi Xinping's idea, right of what he wants to represent, including how he wants to ascertain China's dominance in the world and be seen. So I'm just wondering, like how that will be reconciled in the long run. But I want to quickly kick it over to and start really with questions that we got from the audience. And one is actually from one of our interns, who's an undergraduate student. So she says, like, does the Chinese public pay attention to Chinese diplomacy? Right, and what does this signal to them? And how does it affect them? Like, does it influence, especially opinion of Chinese youth about who they are and what they represent and how they should see themselves and carry themselves? Do you have any thoughts about that?

Peter Martin 32:06

Yeah, so I think, you know, the Chinese public is a little bit like the US public in this regard, or the British public in that people kind of get on with their lives, and they they don't focus on the minute details of international diplomacy. And so that's kind of the first qualifier. The second qualifier is that there are a lot of them, 1.4 billion of them, and that it's really, really hard to generalize. But yeah, with those provisos in mind, my perception is that the wolf warrior diplomacy is quite popular with the public. And I think the reason for that is that there was this widespread belief for a long, long time that Chinese diplomats had been far too accommodating to the outside world, especially to the US. Far too deferential, far too polite, far too equipped to ask for permission. And actually, in the 2000s, there were numerous incidents where members of the public sent posted calcium tablets to the Foreign Ministry in Beijing with this idea that Chinese diplomat needed to strengthen their backbones. That's something that that as far as I understand doesn't happen anymore. And I think the reason for that is that kind of that the Chinese Foreign Ministry has moved closer into line behind members of the Chinese public who have been hearing for decades, by the way now from the Chinese government that China's time is approaching, that China is a natural leader in the world and is destined for greatness. And, and they want its diplomats to follow suit. And so insofar as they pay attention, I think on the whole people like the assertive tone.

Alexandra Lieben 34:01

When you were when you a journalist in Beijing, right, and you also did the research on your books? How was your time? Did you feel like you were being censored? Did you feel like you were being observed in the work you? Did you feel constrained in any way?

Peter Martin 34:17

Yeah. So I think when you're actually in Beijing, the government has such a close lock on that city. You know, there are security cameras everywhere, lots of plainclothes police. I think that they really have a quite comfortable with the grip that they have on what you're doing there and their ability to kind of keep tabs. So unless you're attending a trial of a human rights activist or doing something that they really dislike, they tend to be a little bit more hands off with you while you're in the Chinese capital. They're watching of course, but they're a bit more hands off. The really kind of hands on treatment comes when you leave the capital. Sometimes you don't get any harassment at all. But sometimes you'll arrive to do something completely innocuous and kind of the full weight of the local Chinese state comes crashing down on you. And I think that's because often, you know, local political elites are quite risk averse, and there's no upside to a foreign journalist showing up and so their overwhelming incentive is just to get rid of you as quickly as they possibly can. Which means following you, telling you to leave, telling you you're breaking the law by being there. That's not true, but telling you that you're doing that, tailing you, all of these kinds of things. And so yeah, it can be pretty intense, especially when you leave Beijing, and especially when you visit sensitive regions like Xinjiang, where you're pretty much guaranteed to feel the heavy hand of the government.

Alexandra Lieben 35:53

You finished the book when you were back here, right? So I don't know, like whether you had sort of free time, unobserve time, in that sense, and like and what that was in terms of accessing sources.

Peter Martin 36:07

Yeah, so I worked on it for a lot of the time I was in Beijing. And it was kind of a labor of love in the early mornings and weekends. And, you know, the vast majority of the source base for the book is actually is open source. So even in China's very closed and very heavily censored political system, it is still remarkable how much information you can gather by just patiently looking through printed and published material. That was also true in the Soviet Union, of course, and it's true today. Lots of the memoirs I used were published at, you know, in the 90s and the 2000s, which was a period of relative openness, compared to Xi Jinping's China. But even now, if you sit down with Xi speeches or read state media, there are there are some times really illuminating little details just thrown in there. And if you collect enough of them, you can start to kind of create a collage and hopefully figure out what's going on.

Alexandra Lieben 37:12

We actually got a question about your sources. And that is, and that is your written sources. You mentioned the memoirs you read, right, and maybe other documents also. Did you read them in Chinese? Or do they exist in English? I guess somebody is interested in reading them?

Peter Martin 37:30

Yeah. They're mostly in Chinese. There were a few of them, which have been translated by the Chinese government. So former Foreign Minister Qian Qichen's memoir, which is called 10 Episodes in Chinese Diplomacy, there's an English edition of that. And Huang Hua, who was a kind of young revolutionary diplomat, who at one point, was the only Chinese ambassador posted overseas during the Cultural Revolution, he was the ambassador to Egypt, everyone else was recalled to Beijing. And he later went on to be foreign minister, his memoir. I forgotten what it's called. But there's an English language edition of that. Most of them you won't find it and unfortunately, you'll have to persevere with the Chinese versions, but those two you can dig into straightaway. And I think they're available on Amazon. Just before anyone misinterprets me, they're really boring. If you buy them and you start reading them, you've been warned

Alexandra Lieben 38:42

In the book, you also mentioned the astonishing turn of Chinese diplomats who at one point were a lot more open conversation partners to other diplomats, sort of as they were debating what was going on in the world and also like how they should position themselves and what strategy may be suitable. For these diplomats, European, American, other international diplomats suddenly find these doors closed, right, that their Chinese colleagues suddenly went by the party line and we're no longer able or willing to deviate from that. And is that really solidly across? Are there still people who are willing to step outside and share what's really going on? Also their concerns about this? Or like, is there an avenue for them to do that. Have frank conversations continued to some extent, and if so, what what form do they take?

Peter Martin 39:46

So I guess my starting point for this is that anyone who's drawn to diplomacy in any country, whether that's the US or it's China or wherever, kind of believes that there is merit in communicating with the outside, otherwise they wouldn't do it, they would sign up for the military or something else. So I think there will always be people in the Chinese system who want to kind of play that role. It's just become much, much harder for them to do so. And that, you know, like you said, that started. It's never been that easy, right? We're talking about periods of relative openness and closedness. But under Xi Jinping, it's become much, much more difficult from 2013 and 14, when the anti corruption campaign really went into full swing, Chinese diplomats started to kind of close up and become more difficult to communicate with. And of course, now, the difficulty of travel means that a lot of dialogue, President Biden's talk with Xi Jinping last night, took place online. But also these kinds of, they're called track two dialogues between former officials and think tankers, they all take place online as well. And, of course, that means that there's no private space, there's no coffee table you can approach and kind of have a quiet word with your interlocutor. It's all scripted and formal. And so I think that has really made it quite difficult to have frank conversations with Chinese interlocutors and and that's, that's kind of worrying, I think, not just from a kind of academic and knowledge perspective, but also because of the role that these exchanges and the Chinese diplomats play in signaling China's intentions. It's so difficult to interpret what the Chinese government wants, on some issues, you know. We have to rely on careful reading of Xi Jinping speeches, or interpreting Chinese state media for little hints. And diplomats alongside those other two methods have really been one of the go to sources. And if you can't have those frank conversations it becomes very, very difficult to interpret what China wants.

Alexandra Lieben 42:11

What is your assessment of the current Chinese ambassador to the US? Do you have any opinions?

Unknown Speaker 42:17

Yeah, I mean, Qin Gang, he actually kind of has a background in dealing with Europe. But he got this job as head of the Protocol Department in the Foreign Ministry, which gave him very, very close access to Xi Jinping for a period of time. And so I think that's the reason he's been sent over here. A little bit like the US President always expects the US Ambassador to have close ties to the White House. So there's a good communication channel there. I think Xi Jinping wants the same thing from his ambassador. So he's kind of broken with convention and chosen someone who is not a US expert. And I think Qin is like, is pretty typical of China's best diplomats in that he's capable of displaying this massive range of public behavior, which spans from funny and charming and fluent English, through to kind of withering dress downs that he, you know, I've spoken to European diplomats, he dealt with him in Beijing, and they just kind of terrified of the way that he behaves sometimes, he can be very, very, very tough. But I think, you know, first and foremost, he's a professional, and he's going to follow the tone that Xi Jinping wants from his ambassador in Washington. And, I think, you know, there's a time and a place for Chinese diplomats to be to be tough with the US as Yang Jiechi showed earlier this year when he dressed down Tony Blinken at meetings in Anchorage, but I think from the Chinese ambassador in Washington, what they want is a credible channel of communication. And so although Qin is capable of being very, very tough, I think he's going to kind of keep his sensible hat on and try to keep those channels open with the State Department, the White House and other places.

Alexandra Lieben 44:09

Mostly an extension right he doesn't have a lot of decision making power on his own because that's what you also say is like that Chinese diplomats are just like basically they're sort of they just relay back what they heard and with little with little decision making power themselves or freedom to move.

Peter Martin 44:25

That's right.

Alexandra Lieben 44:26

So it makes it makes it less fruitful for our diplomats here and policymakers

Peter Martin 44:35

Yeah, there was a case actually in the in the George W. Bush administration, where I'm not going to name who it was, but a pretty senior US official met with people from the Chinese Embassy and he just said, Look, guys, I know your talking points, can we please just get to the back and forth because I don't want to hear this again. Yeah, it can be can be frustrating to deal with that.

Alexandra Lieben 44:57

I got a question about social media actually. Can you comment on the role of social media in China, right? And how the Chinese think about the US.?

Peter Martin 45:08

Yeah. So two big topics. Social media kind of emerged as this, this incredibly liberating force in Chinese society. China's media sector never went through the kind of privatization that say the Russian media sector went through in the 1990s. And so, Chinese newspapers and magazines can be extremely stale. And there are exceptions, but especially on current affairs, that very stale and very by-the-party-line. And so the emergence of social media, even though it was censored, and subject to all kinds of limits really exploded and provided this kind of public space for people to talk about social and political issues. And, that kind of exploded around the sort of 2011 2012 type time there was a there's a really vibrant debate online. But , you know, after the Arab Spring, and under Xi Jinping that space for discussion has kind of shrunk. And you can still, you can still find little snide references and hints at dissatisfaction. But it's become much, much more difficult to find that kind of vibrant debate online in China, and lots of it has moved into kind of private discussion rooms on forums like WeChat, instead of more public venues, like Weibo. And that, you know, but Chinese diplomats, tying it back to the book, have kind of embraced all kinds of social media platforms, they're actually banned in China itself, most notably Twitter. And I think they've done that because they, they think that's an effective way to take the fight directly to the Western public, rather than having to go through, you know, fake news media, and that kind of thing. That's their perspective, not mine. But in the second question, in terms of what Chinese people think of the US, it's, again, really hard to generalize. But I guess I would just say that it's an incredibly complicated relationship with many, many layers. Lots of people in China, including Xi Jinping, love Hollywood movies and the US cultural industry. You know, the NBA is extraordinarily popular. Chinese elites aspire to send their kids to universities in the US. Many of them want their children to speak English. And lots of Chinese people, of course, decide to travel and ultimately to live here. So there is this kind of like, love and admirational sides of the relationship. But there's also at the same time in the minds of many of the same people, there is this perception that the US bullies other countries, that it gangs up on China, that it's unfairly malign China and then want to hold it rise. And, and I think kind of paired with that, a perception that a lot of Americans look down on Chinese people. And that, so those things create quite a potent cocktail, where that, you know, the very same people can can kind of have this this admiration and this frustration and loathing in their heads all at the same time.

Alexandra Lieben 48:47

Mm hmm. And that actually gets me also to sort of, I wanted to ask another question, but quickly, is there concern that Trump gets reelected? Because that didn't exactly help the relationship.

Peter Martin 49:05

I also think, you know, so focus on the Chinese government, but I think the Chinese government has pretty mixed feelings about that, too. There's a longer term perspective, which says that, you know, we talked earlier about how the US alliance system is such a massive source of strength for the country. Well, Trump is hostile to that system, and another Trump term might mean that the system is weakened. So there is an argument that this will kind of open up or further open up what China's leaders think of as a window of strategic opportunity for the country. There's also just the short term worry that, you know, they like predictability and stability and Trump represents the opposite of that. And it's difficult for any foreign leader to to be on the receiving end of that kind of unpredictability, but it's especially difficult when Trump has kind of singled you out as a country against which he wants to fight a trade war. And so I think it's fair to say there are mixed feelings there.

Alexandra Lieben 50:05

Yeah, speaking about alliances and Western alliances, the AUKUS pact that was just concluded. That also like sort of pits in a way, in this particular case, Australia, the US and England against China. What the shift in alliances but also like, sort of what does it mean for the other Pacific Rim nations. But here, too, when people have said, how's it going to affect the relationship going forward between the US and China? And also what role will Taiwan play in this, right? Does Taiwan become a proxy for China? So to speak, so as to, to signal its displeasure? How do you see this already complicated relationship - First China, Taiwan, but then also the role that the US plays in this -continue or develop?

Peter Martin 51:02

Yeah, I kind of think of the AUKUS pact as an illustration of why, if we're moving into a Cold War, a new Cold War, it's gonna look very different to the last one. Obviously, the the last cold war against the Soviet Union involved two hostile blocks, which had, you know, an Eastern Bloc, Western Bloc didn't have too much to do with each other. And in the case of China, and the US, the economies are incredibly intertwined. But also countries because they also have these deep economic links with China, they're not willing to just separate off into a separate bloc with the US. So we're seeing these kind of coalition's of the willing, some big and some small, you know. It's possible for countries to stand some countries to stand together with the US on human rights, other countries to stand together with it on trade, maybe the European Union, and then probably a much, much smaller group of countries to really be explicit about challenging Beijing on military terms. And that's why you see this, this slightly awkward grouping of Australia, the UK and the US, because that's the coalition of the willing, when it comes to that issue. And, so I think we're likely to see a lot more of that, and Beijing will see it as quite threatening, and we'll all have to decide whether we're going to call this a Cold War, or we're going to call it something something different. And Taiwan, I think, to say that kind of Beijing thinks of it as a card or a proxy, I think almost understates the importance that they attached to it. Really, from 1949 onwards, it's been the number one issue for Chinese policymakers. And the kind of the key test of their ability to demonstrate that they've made China great, strong and powerful and respected, is their ability to get Taiwan back. And, you know, when you think of wolf warrior diplomacy, you know, we might think of it as like a pretty new phenomenon. But if in the 1990s, at the height of China's charm offensive, if you said something wrong about Taiwan, they would come down on you, you know, fire and fury. And so, you know, I'm sure it will it will feature and kind of regional machinations but but the reality is that China really is kind of willing to upend the entire table of cooperation with any country, including the US if it feels like its bottom line on Taiwan has been crossed. And so I think that makes it quite difficult to use as a pawn for either side.

Alexandra Lieben 53:50

Yeah, a dangerous one. Right. It could escalate to military confrontation. And that will be the one place because otherwise, China is not keen on doing that. It has understood fairly well, really well, that economic advancement is much more productive. And of course, like, for a whole host of reasons. Speaking on military engagement versus economic engagement. Here is Vladimir Putin, and here is Xi Jinping right. There are similar aspirations for their respective countries, and from your sort of comparative vantage points, what's their relationship now? And how do you see that progress?

Peter Martin 54:34

Yeah, um, so I guess that on a personal level, Xi and Putin seem to have this remarkable chemistry, I think that they see the world in relatively similar ways. Apparently, growing up in the Communist Party elite in China and spending your career in the KGB gives you quite a kind of similar mindset. And, you know, for whatever reason, there's a kind of melding of mines there. There's also a melding of interests. And both countries are frustrated with the way that they feel like the US and its alliance system throws its weight around, and they want to be able to provide a counter to that. Of course, there are a lot of tensions underneath the surface between the two countries, which I think are likely to grow over time as Russia more and more becomes the junior partner in that arrangement, and the Chinese economy, which already far eclipses Russia's, will do so even more in the future. But while a lot of people said for a long time, you know, this is a marriage of convenience, it's not going to last, I think kind of the most interesting data point for that relationship is military sales and military cooperation. For a long time Russia was holding back its best military technology from Beijing, refusing to sell it, refusing to transfer the technology. And in the last few years, it has done a pretty dramatic about face and decided that it will do that. And that's a pretty sure sign. I think that whatever tensions might be there beneath the surface, these two countries and their strong partnership is going to be a pretty formidable force for a long time to come.

Alexandra Lieben 56:18

Something for us to reckon with. Last question, before I release you back out into your day. And thank you again for being here is about the 5G summit last night, right yesterday? What does that mean for us? Fo you feel like they came out looking friendly with each other and professing to willingness to cooperate and all of this? Famously like during the Obama administration that we had a similar sort of point where it was like, yes, we have an understanding around intellectual property, cybersecurity, all of this and none of that held. So what's our expectations coming out of this summit? Do we see a more productive relationship ahead?

Peter Martin 57:00

I think that compared to the Obama era, both sides have kind of pretty dramatically scaled back what they think is possible through direct bilateral diplomacy. You think in the Obama era, there was there was a pretty strong desire on the part of US policy makers to be about shaping China's behavior and shaping China's intentions using US statecraft. Chinese leaders, Xi Jinping approached the US and talked about a new type of great power relations based on mutual respect. And so they also had this idea that if through dialogue, they could come to some kind of understanding, which would allow them to live in harm in relative harmony, or at least to tolerate each other. I don't think either side kind of sees bilateral engagement in those terms. But I do think that both sides have an interest in, in getting out of this just spiral of deteriorating relations. Both countries have domestic policy priorities and need to make sure that their economies are kind of put on a stable footing after the virus, not to mention international priorities, like climate change. And so I don't think either side, you know, last night, we kind of saw that right. We had some kind of reassuring words from both leaders that they don't want to get into a death spiral with each other, but but really none of the underlying factors that have led the two sides into tension with each other, whether that's trade, you know, military, strategic intentions, any of these, none of these things were really addressed in any meaningful way. And perhaps that's the best we can hope for at the moment.

Alexandra Lieben 58:47

It sets the tone, it makes a difference. And actually helpful tone for us to conclude our conversation with you today. I would like to thank our audience for joining us. I would also like to invite you to join us again for the second International Education Week collaboration we have this afternoon at five o'clock, which is an event run by our wonderful interns and deals with intercultural communication and also living and working and studying abroad, right. What does it mean? What is culture shock? How do we handle each other's cultures? how do we not want to face in and misinterpret each other? So please join us today again at five o'clock in the afternoon. And for now, thank you, Peter, thank you very much for your time. Everybody, the link is in the chat. Order the book. It is really a wonderful book. Thank you very much.

Peter Martin 59:39

Thank you so much.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai