Part 1 of the 3-part series: The CCP’s War on America
The age of the Chinese regime’s “benevolence” is long over; war was declared years ago.
Communist China has been at war with its main adversary—the United States of America—for years. Sadly, most Americans have not been paying attention. After Mao Zedong’s death in 1976, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) became quiescent, with a general policy promoted by Deng Xiaoping.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is partial to the number three for cultural and superstitious reasons. For example, the number three represents Buddha and stands for Heaven, Earth, and human being; and great respect and reverence are given to three historical Chinese kingdoms.
No slouches on superstition and luck, the CCP routinely capitalizes on the number three to pursue its goals and objectives.
A lot of “threes” have been orchestrated by the CCP since 1949.
- Mao’s Three Phase Theory of revolutionary war, which included establishing a secure base of operations, expansion of controlled areas through terror and attacks on isolated enemy units, and destruction of the enemy in large scale battle.
- Mao’s Three Main Rules of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) discipline: 1) obey all orders; 2) take nothing so much as a needle or thread from the masses; and 3) turn in everything captured.
- Mao’s Three Anti-campaign, which “targeted communist cadres who had become too close to China’s capitalists.”
- Mao’s Three Worlds, defined as first world (United States and USSR at the time), second world (Japan, Canada, and Europe), and the third world (everybody else).
- The Three Warfares, which include public opinion warfare, psychological warfare, and legal warfare.
- The Three U.S.-China communiques, which established the flawed “one-China policy” that essentially conceded Taiwan to the PRC.
The CCP’s propensity to capitalize on “the luck of threes” starts right at the top with the appointment of the ruling Chinese leader as general secretary of the CCP, president of the PRC, and chairman of the Central Military Commission. Lucky Xi Jinping! Three jobs filled by one man, which is the essence of the Chinese communist dictatorship, in theory and practice being checked only by the Central Committee of the CCP.
Upon assuming power, Xi launched his own campaign of threes. The first threesome involved grandiose economic initiatives: the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI, also called the “One Belt, One Road”), Made in China 2025, and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. All three were aimed at consolidating China as the world’s leading economy for all time.
Another example of Xi’s threes was announced last year at the 2020 China International Trade in Services Global Service Trade Summit: 1) jointly create an open and inclusive environment for cooperation; 2) jointly activate the cooperation momentum led by innovation; and 3) jointly create a mutually beneficial and win-win cooperation situation.
A third example is Xi’s “third historical resolution” at the Sixth Plenary session of the 19th Central Committee of the CCP earlier this month, as reported by state-run media. The “historical” reference relates to Xi’s resolution being the third of its kind, following in the footsteps of Mao and Deng. Xi also seeks to triple down by winning a rare third five-year term in office, which would elevate him as the third Chinese “paramount leader” along with Mao and Deng, completing in effect a trifecta or triple threes. This personal objective will likely be achieved during the CCP’s 20th National Party Congress in 2022.
But the most important “triple three” was Xi’s initiation and/or furtherance of three threes of warfare against the United States in a dramatic departure from the policies of Deng and his successors. Deng’s policies were not overtly belligerent and involved penetrating, coopting, and leveraging international institutions in order to gain access to resources, foreign direct investment, advanced technology, and Western methods in order to restore the Chinese economy and professional class that was destroyed during Mao’s Cultural Revolution.
Xi’s three threes of warfare are directly aimed at elevating China to world leadership while destroying its primary adversary, the United States.
Those nine elements of CCP warfare against the United States and the West include the following:
Ideological (or Political) Warfare
The CCP is aggressively attempting to “discredit the tenets of liberal capitalism so that notions like individual freedom and constitutional democracy come to be seen as the relics of an obsolete system,” according to Tablet Magazine. The goal in undermining democratic values and individual liberties of Western democracies is to both safeguard China’s own authoritarian regime and also to assert world leadership.
Euphemisms such as “whole process democracy,” “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” and “socialist democracy with Chinese characteristics”—that are endlessly repeated by Chinese diplomats and Xi himself—mask the CCP’s true intention to fundamentally change the world order and replace Western liberal democracies with the ideological precepts that lead to CCP authoritarian rule over all nations in the future.
One important aspect of the CCP ideological warfare against the United States has been to foment discord and division among Americans, which has been ongoing for decades. Beijing’s greatest success in that regard to date has been the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, which was founded by three self-proclaimed Marxist women and has been supported by the Chinese Progressive Association, Freedom Road Socialist Organization, and other pro-Chinese communist organizations (as noted here, here, here, here, and here). BLM-supported Critical Race Theory being taught in public schools continues to divide Americans and sow ideological turmoil in the United States.
Legal Warfare
This is an excellent definition of legal warfare as employed by the CCP: “Legal warfare, at its most basic, involves ‘arguing that one’s own side is obeying the law, criticizing the other side for violating the law [weifa], and making arguments for one’s own side in cases where there are also violations of the law,’” according to The Heritage Foundation.
The CCP’s goal in employing legal warfare is to undermine the international system and especially the Western tradition of the “rule of law” by propagating a Chinese legal framework that supersedes international law.
For example, one CCP objective is to extend the new National Security Law to all Chinese regardless of where they live around the world. With that assumed control comes the ability to influence events and policies in countries that have a significant minority population of Chinese, with the eventual goal being to extend the law in order prosecute anyone who violates its provisions, whether Chinese or not.
According to Article 38 of the law, it can apply even to offenses committed “outside the region by a person who is not a permanent resident of the region.” That means an American penning an editorial for a U.S. newspaper that argues for, say, sanctions against China, could technically fall afoul of the law for “inciting hatred” against Beijing. If its jurisdiction is ever accepted, this will mean the end of national sovereignty of other nations while turning the United Nations into nothing more than a CCP enforcement agency.
Psychological Warfare
While the PLA “Political Work Regulations”—published in 2003 and 2010 that address the employment of psychological warfare—are focused on pre-war activities to “soften up the enemy” for kinetic warfare, the CCP continuously employs the basic concepts to achieve other objectives. For example, to undermine any international coalitions oriented toward stopping PRC aggression and intimidation of its neighbors and others, including forced PLA intrusions into disputed areas, predatory Chinese mercantilist trade practices, rampant continuing economic espionage, and CCP efforts to unilaterally exert Chinese leadership in all spheres of human endeavors.
CCP psychological warfare involves the coordinated use of Chinese leadership, diplomats, and state-run media, as well as CCP-friendly foreign leaders, diplomats, academics, and media to sap the will of Americans and others who publicly impede CCP goals, objectives, and aggressive actions. CCP psychological warfare “includes diplomatic pressure, rumors, false narratives, and harassment to express displeasure, assert hegemony, and convey threats,” according to Marine Corps University.
These actions are all aimed at conveying a perception of lack of public support for anti-China public policies in the United States and other countries while marginalizing voices that speak out about Chinese authoritarian practices.
The ongoing coordinated effort directed against international support for the defense of Taiwan against a PLA attack is a good example of CCP psychological warfare aimed at a particular target.
Conclusion
The above are the first three of the three threes warfare being conducted by the CCP against the United States and the rest of the world. Part II of this series will continue the discussion.
