Former White House deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger wrote to the WSJ on 26 June, warning under the headline “Beijing Targets American Business” that Beijing is doing its best to As the U.S. and Chinese Communist governments compete fiercely over strategy and ideology, corporate tendencies will determine which side wins.
In the weeks since President Biden took office, Beijing’s top brass has waged a chaotic information war against the United States, including speeches, letters and statements that are aimed not at the new U.S. government but at U.S. businesses, Boming noted. For example, in early February, Yang Jiechi, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, delivered a video message to U.S. business leaders and former government officials, “painting a big picture” of investment and trade opportunities in China, and finally warning that border, Hong Kong and Taiwan issues are China’s “red line,” apparently to pressure political and economic bosses on the stage. The last warning was that the issues of border, Hong Kong and Taiwan are China’s “red lines”, apparently to pressure the political and economic bosses on stage to lobby the Biden Administration to overturn Trump‘s China Policy.
In late January, Xi also urged European and American companies to oppose governments’ policies of “economic decoupling” from China at a video conference at the Davos Economic Forum. Xi also personally wrote to a respected U.S. businessman urging him to “actively promote U.S.-China economic and trade cooperation. After that, China announced sanctions against nearly 30 current or former U.S. officials (among them Booming) to make clear that the statement was not a “suggestion,” but a “request.
The message from Beijing is clear: You (companies) must make a choice, and if you want to do business in China, you must abandon American values, including ignoring the massacre of religious and racially vulnerable people in China, ignoring the Chinese government’s broken promises on major commitments – such as international treaties guaranteeing Hong Kong a “high degree of autonomy ” and stop dealing with officials who uphold security beliefs unless the goal is to lobby them to support Beijing.
At the same Time, Beijing wants the world to rely on China forever for political purposes. Xi Jinping made it clear at this year’s National People’s Congress that he wants China to stop relying on developed countries for high-end products, and instead wants developed countries to rely heavily on China for high-tech products and raw materials. In other words, “decoupling” is precisely Beijing’s strategy, as long as it benefits Beijing. More importantly, the Chinese government is no longer hiding this strategy.
Bo Ming pointed out that China’s trade with Australia had reached record highs in previous years, but last year Beijing imposed restrictions on Australian wine, beef and barley imports for political reasons, and through an unnamed Chinese official released a file from the Chinese Embassy in Australia to the Australian media, listing 14 “anti-China crimes” against Australia, implicitly making “political demands” on the Australian government The Chinese embassy’s dossier was released to the Australian media through an unnamed Chinese official, listing 14 “anti-China crimes” against Australia and implicitly making “political demands” on the Australian government, including withdrawing a bill to counteract Chinese influence and asking the Australian media to suppress news critical of China, which is Beijing’s way of “forcing politics through economics.
Bomen stressed that U.S. entrepreneurs have always sought simple, profitable business relationships and resisted viewing the U.S.-China relationship as an ideological tug of war. The strategy released by the two leaders makes it clear that ideological competition is unavoidable and even a central issue. As a result, Beijing knows that it can no longer influence the Washington political scene, so it is taking aim at other levels of U.S. society, with business being the bullseye.
Booming suggests that U.S. companies should first understand how the situation has evolved over the past few years and acknowledge that there is no way to change it, i.e., it is difficult to please both Washington and Beijing. Secondly, they should start analyzing what happens when the supply chain is fragmented, because after all, the rush to focus production in authoritarian countries is not the right track. He argued that a full decoupling of the 2 major economies is just Chinese propaganda and the talk of some U.S. alarmists, but that a limited decoupling – especially in key technology areas – is possible and desirable, and that corporate bosses must be aware of it.
Finally, Bomen warned that the U.S. and China are both “running a marathon” in which only one side can win. Assuming the U.S. can’t get things right in the next 4 years, it will lose the race, although it may be many years before it realizes it lost long ago. He noted that Beijing is trying to win with “the will of one man” and that the strength of a free society is the human spirit. However, Beijing is correct in its view that U.S. business leaders, boards of directors and investors will be the key to determining who will rise to the top in the United States and China.
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