SEOUL — Policymakers must defy increasingly effective and sophisticated Chinese disinformation efforts if they are to get a realistic grasp of the issues and keep East Asia’s hot spots from exploding into war.
Amid an intensifying China-U.S. battle for influence raging across multiple domains – ideological, political, economic, military – this was a key message that emerged from the “Toward Peace in the Indo-Pacific” forum, organized Thursday in the South Korean capital by the Universal Peace Federation.
Given East Asia’s economic dynamism and the potential for conflict in numerous areas, the region’s import is obvious even to distant leaders.
“Developments in the Indo-Pacific are having an impact on Southeast Europe,” Kosovo Premier Albin Kurti told the UPF forum. “India, China and Indonesia account for more than half of the world’s population, … 60% of world GDP is concentrated [in the region], and it is home to seven of the world’s largest armies.”
With carnage engulfing Ukraine, Asia conflicts sometimes struggle to make it to the front pages, but analysts say several crises are quietly simmering and threaten to boil over.
Ex-Austrian Minister of Defense and House Speaker Werner Fasslabend said that three Indo-Pacific flashpoints – the divided Korean peninsula, Taiwan and the South China Sea – are “probably the hottest spots you can find in coming years.”
“What can be the means to secure peace?” Mr. Fasslabend asked.
The forum’s organizer, the UPF, is a global body founded by Moon Hak-ja, widow of the late Rev. Moon Sun-myung. The couple also founded The Washington Times.
China’s genius for disinformation
China, forum participants agreed, stands out as the key to all three crises, either as a possible brake on potential North Korean aggression or as an accelerant in the clash with the U.S. and its allies over Taiwan and control of the South China Sea. China’s increasing efforts to try to shape the narrative with disinformation – an art at which China has historically excelled – are making all three problems harder to solve.
China’s “grey zone” tactics in the information wars are nothing new in the land that birthed master strategist Sun Tzu.
“Chinese strategy has a tremendous concern with manipulating the other side’s view,” said Michael Pillsbury, a leading Sinologist who has worked on China policy with multiple U.S. administrations.
This approach is visible in three Chinese characters “fa,” “xi” and “mow,” which, combined, mean to counter, thwart or block the adversary’s strategy. The third character is also linked to deception, Mr. Pillsbury, whom some consider a China hawk, explained.
Related characters include “ma” – a sense of numbness or laziness – and “bi” – to prevent or paralyze. Combined, they mean lulling the opponent into complacency, Mr. Pillsbury said.
But one danger of disinformation is that it raises conflict risks, as neither side is getting or giving an accurate assessment of the dangers in store.
“Misperceptions on both sides, or misperceptions about the balance of power, lead to war,” he warned. “Usually no country starts a war it thinks it is going to lose.”
Complacency may explain the weak appreciation by outsiders of a deep historic debate within China. Confucianism – a philosophy of harmony, sincerity and righteous behavior – is considered by many to be the pinnacle of Chinese thought and a guiding force for policymakers. But generations of thinkers inside China itself have challenged it, Mr. Pillsbury said.
Their question is whether it is better to be a Confucian leader – or just look like one. For many, the ideal is to “appear to be a Confucian – honest, sincere and a lover of peace – but inside, to be ruthless and ignore the law,” Mr. Pillsbury said.
With President Xi Jinping having publicly visited Confucius’ birthplace, the debate remains relevant.
“Some books in China note that all Chinese dynasties were created by force,” Mr. Pillsbury said. “No voting!”
The China expert, author of 2016’s “The 100-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower”, admits many scholars disagree with his thesis, insisting Beijing has no such strategy. The divisions among experts only make the job of U.S. policymakers trying to calibrate China relations that much harder.
“Getting China right is having a consensus and not just saying bad things, but having an action plan,” he said. “There are almost 100 ideas on how to deal with China, and many have been drafted already, but need a majority to pass [Congress].”
“All this legislation is failing,” he added. “It seems China and its friends are playing a role in this.”
Mr. Pillsbury praised ex-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for the pragmatism of his China policy during the Trump administration. Mr. Pompeo admitted many in Washington were slow to recognize the threat posed by a rising Beijing.
“We allowed this problem to advance and that makes it difficult to confront,” he said. “We are going to have to live in a world that is real and factual. … When we turn away from truth and refuse to acknowledge evil’s existence, this is when we get conflict.”
The contest is not limited to two countries, Mr. Pompeo, who was Mr. Trump’s CIA director before moving to the State Department, said.
“I often hear that this conflict around the world is between the U.S. and China. I don’t believe that,” he said. “This is about the model that will be set for the entire world. … It is not about picking sides between U.S. power and Chinese power, but about decency, dignity and property rights.”
Recent developments suggest that realization is seeping through.
The way forward
Mr. Pompeo said he was “deeply heartened” to see South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s “bold initiative” to upgrade relations with Japan. Mr. Yoon’s move – deeply unpopular at home – to try to move past long-term historical disputes between the two key U.S. allies paves the way for greater trilateral cooperation with Washington against threats from both China and North Korea.
Japanese Premier Fumio Kishida is set to visit Mr. Yoon in Seoul Sunday in the latest sign of warming relations between Tokyo and Seoul.
The rapprochement comes as public opinion surveys in the last two years here found that China has replaced Japan as the least popular country among South Koreans.
South Korean officials say they feel the change.
“I used to get calls from the Chinese Embassy but not anymore. Now the Japanese Embassy is asking to have meetings,” said Kim Geun-sik, who chairs the Unification Committee of South Korea’s ruling People Power Party. “This shows the changes going on.”
Long-held beliefs that China would move in a more liberal, democratic direction as its economy opened up to the world are evaporating, forum participants said.
Mr. Pompeo said Henry Kissinger-era China policies “may have made sense in 1972, or even 1982.” But he argued they are no longer appropriate in view of recent Chinese actions such as its aggressive stance toward Taiwan, the island democracy the mainland has never ruled but which the Chinese Communist regime claims as its sovereign territory.
“We all know the reality: Taiwan is not part of China,” Mr. Pompeo stated. “China has upset the understanding that [it] would not attempt to undermine Taiwan. … That was a central thesis and Xi has made a fundamentally different decision – it is not Taiwan that is upsetting the status quo.”
Forum participants noted that authoritarian regimes like China and North Korea face challenges of their own, notably, lack of “pull” power.
The dilemma faced by North Korea’s leadership is “the prosperity of South Korea,” said former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Pyongyang is further boxed in because its leaders know that war “would be the end of the dictatorship.”
Mr. Xi has different problems, the Georgia Republican added.
The Indo-Pacific region is “not a U.S. empire,” but a region where democratic states such as Australia, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Taiwan are coming together to ensure that “China cannot dominate.”
This “coalition of freedom” has a message: “’We are happy to trade with you and live as neighbors, but will not tolerate your dictatorship trying to control us,’” Mr. Gingrich said.
The arc of the long Cold War clash between the West and the Soviet Union provides a glimmer of optimism for East Asia, Mr. Pillsbury said.
“There is a chance that China will have a peaceful democracy,” the analyst said. “America did not bring down the Soviet Union, they did it to themselves. And America is not trying to bring down the CPP or bring down Xi.”
The problem now is not U.S. intentions but leadership paranoia in Beijing.
“Right now, Xi does not believe this,” Mr. Pillsbury concluded. “How can we get him to believe he lives in a much happier world?”
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.