It is my belief that rarely do seemingly individual issues ever occur in isolation or by sheer coincidence. Especially in geo politics and in countries that have “institutional” memory. Without a playbook it becomes harder to decipher these individual issues correctly and, eventually to connect them. China has had a history of institutionalized memory and is never hesitant to play a geo-political chess game for its own benefit. This is one such game at play.

We will look briefly at modern Chinese history, how Chinese presidents are chosen, and their “legacy” in this part. Part 2 will deal mostly with President Xi and his vision for China, current state of Chinese economy and, finally, how all these affects India

History of the conflict

By now I believe that everyone has heard about the South China Sea [SCS] conflict and the causes for it. Briefly, China claims more than the 500 nautical km exclusive economic zone as agreed under the UNCLOS ^[1] [United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea] agreement, of which China is also a signatory. China claims that some parts of the disputed islands have been part of China at some point in their history and thus all these islands belong to it. Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei ^[2] et al also claim parts of the SCS since it falls under their 500 nautical km exclusive economic zone. These islands and the SCS have potentially huge oil deposits and China wants to militarize parts of these islands to project power. As Subhomoy Bhattacharjee wrote here, it is more than what meets the eye. China wants to project power to control flow of energy in the Indian Ocean – Pacific Ocean sphere.  [A more detailed explanation can be found here, here and here.]

Even after the UNCLOS judgement, China is outright ignoring it and in fact it has trashed the judgement ^[3]. Since the UN has practically no teeth, there is nothing much that it can do to enforce its judgement. To understand why China is practically looking to escalate the conflict and why Chinese foreign policy’s been so aggressive under Xi Jingping, we have to go back in time.

China after Mao

Like many first generation leaders of countries, Mao Zedong ruled until his death in 1976. Chinese economy was in shambles due to his missteps since 1950s. After him, his chosen successor Hua Guofeng became the Supreme Leader. His greatest work for China was to demolish the “Gang of Four” and reinstate Deng Xiaoping back into public life. That was the turning point in modern Chinese history. Deng had a running feud with Mao over economic policy best suited to China. With Mao’s death and Hua being sidelined, Deng finally had the authority to change China’s destiny and unleash the Chinese dragon. The Chinese economy started to grow consistently at more than 9% year after year after year.

Hua's ousting helped establish a norm within China that political leaders who lost power struggles would not be physically harmed or jailed. Apart from the economic revolution, the most significant thing Deng did was to retire after 10 years as Chairman. That single act has become the unwritten rule in Chinese constitution and every President after Deng has served only two 5-year terms. There are unconfirmed reports that just as unofficially incoming presidents pardon the outgoing ones in the USA, China has something very similar unwritten rule as far as ex-Presidents are concerned ^[5].

After Deng came Jiang Zemin. The Tiananmen Square protests and failure to handle it properly cost Deng’s chosen successor Zhao Ziyang his political future. Jiang Zemin was the Party chairman in Shanghai and forced the international “World Economic Herald” to shut down. In times when Beijing was looking for a leader, this act got him recognized and subsequently he was made the Chairman. At that time, he was considered a stop gap arrangement. He eventually played his cards well and became the Chairman of Central Military Commission (CMC), General Secretary of CCP and President. His elevation marked the end of social liberalization started by Deng, though the economic policy continued. Jiang Zemin’s persecution of certain sects, his appointments to CCP et al have had repercussions that are still felt in China.

How Xi became the President

Hu Jintao became the General Secretary of the CCP and President in 2002 & 2003 respectively. But he did not have any real powers since Jiang was still the chairman of CMC. Jiang’s right hand Zeng Qinghong was the vice president of CCP and was a real roadblock to President Hu and Premier Wen Jiabao. Until 2006, after an assassination attempt, Hu’s writ ran only on the economic and foreign policy front. Military was still under Jiang and his gang. So much so that when Defense Secretary Robert Gates visited China a new stealth jet was tested, and it caught President Hu by as much surprise as it did Secretary Gates ^[17]!

Slowly Hu navigated the landmines set by Jiang and consolidated his power but that took him most of his first 5 year tenure. In the 17^th party congress in 2007, Hu had to manipulate the Politburo and the Party congress to get them to choose his successor. Else, it would have been another of Jiang’s proxy and everything that Hu had done the past 5 years would go down the drain. It could also break the CCP. It was at this juncture that Hu got two of “his guys” into the Politburo – Li Keqiang and Xi Jingping.

Jiang and Zeng Qinghong blocked Hu’s nominee Li and did not let Li Keqiang step up to power. Jiang did not have anyone on the Standing Committee that he could name in Li’s place, and so he reluctantly put forward Xi Jinping. Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao had no problem accepting Xi Jinping, as they shared a common outlook. All three considered themselves students of Hu Yaobang, the Party General Secretary who helped bring economic reform to communist China, and who favored political reform ^[9].

In effect, Jiang was playing for time. Xi would become the President in 2012, a good 5 years from the 17^th Party congress and Jiang pinned his hopes on Bo Xilai [yes, THAT Bo Xilai] to get onto the Politburo and succeed domestic security czar Zhou Yongkang. The Political and Legal Affairs Committee, PLAC, had expanded tremendously during Jiang’s regime and was the second power center within CCP. So having Bo there would practically continue Jiang’s persecution of Fulan Gong and give him a chance to outmaneuver his candidate in place of Xi. But then Wang Lijun, Bo Xilai’s assistant, fled to US Consulate at Chengdu ^[18], throwing a spanner in Jiang’s plans. The Wang Lijun incident was the end of line for Bo [and, by extension, Jiang Zemin] and resulted in Xi getting complete control over CCP and CMC along with the Presidency.

Hu used this incident to arrest Bo Xilai. The Jiang faction tried to start a military standoff with Japan in August 2012 to whip up mass protests to pressure Hu and Xi. Mass protests would lead to marital law and that would delay Xi’s crowning and would give Jiang faction breathing space. It was at this critical juncture that Xi chaired a meeting with “princelings”. Princelings are the sons and daughters of the party’s old guards and founders. It also includes second generation entrepreneurs and military generals. They exert disproportionate influence thru their families’ political and economic networks. It is considered prudent for the incoming leader to submit to them his plans for a tenure that will last, if all goes well, for the next ten years. And given that Xi Jingping is himself one of the princelings it made this meeting all the more important.

Now this is where we move from the domain of hard facts to grapevine since no one knows what exactly happened. Some news articles reported that the meeting turned violent and, literally hammer, tongs and chairs flew ^[11].  That Xi used this opportunity to force the princelings’ and CCP’s hand into giving him full control is undisputed.  He cancelled a meeting with Secretary Clinton and signaled to everyone that he was not willing to be the next President. Xi had been originally chosen in 2007 since he was the acceptable to both sides and there was no one, that late in the game, to replace him. If Xi stepped down then both factions thought CCP would immediately collapse. So unlike his predecessor, Xi walked into Presidency fully in control of both CCP and CMC.

Dharma Wheel and Jiang Zemin

It is not possible to explain the deep divisions amongst the princelings and CCP without expanding on the primary cause of the schism. During Deng’s tenure, partly due to the atrocities done by “Gang of Four” in the name of “Cultural Revolution” and, partly due to opening of the economy, the Chinese got a whiff of freedom in political and free thinking space ^[24]. This eventually led to the Tiananmen Square massacre. But by then power had moved from Deng to Jiang Zemin who strongly opposed the freedom of expression and political reforms and he started putting the controls back. He used the Tiananmen Square protests for clamping down on thoughts of democracy in China.

In 1992, a spiritual practice, called Falun Gong that combines meditation and Qigong exercise started to gain traction in Northeast China ^[12]. Falun Gong literally means “Dharma Wheel Practice” and as the name implies, it is grounded in the tenets of Truthfulness, Compassion and, Tolerance. It was first introduced by Li Hongzhi and initially it had support of the Chinese government. Falun Gong had differentiated itself from other qigong groups in its emphasis on morality, low cost, and health benefits. It rapidly spread via word-of-mouth, attracting a wide range of practitioners from all walks of life, including numerous members of the Chinese Communist Party ^[12]. In 1996, Li broke off from the Chinese government and started to operate outside of the official sanction. It did not matter much since this was an apolitical organization with its only goal of improving the mental and physical wealth of Chinese.

But once Falun Gong lost the official sanction, the Chinese media apparatus started discriminating against it. Falun Gong members responded by writing letters, peaceful demonstrations etc. In a short seven years’ time, the number of Falun Gong practitioners grew from none to 100 million ^[25]. The Communist Party said that Falun Gong competes with the CCP for the masses and that it was a religion. Jiang Zemin and the Communist Party feared Falun Gong because once this traditional morality was accepted by the public, nothing could prevent it from spreading rapidly. The problem, from CCP’s perspective, was when the number of people who practiced Falun Gong exceeded that of CCP members.

In April, 1999 an article critical of Falun Gong was written by a physicist in Tianjin University’s magazine.  As was their norm, Falun Gong practitioners responded by picketing the offices of the magazine and asked for a retraction. Unlike previous instances, this picketing was met with force and some practitioners were beaten up. The Falun Gong community quickly mobilized a response and upwards of 10,000 practitioners gathered near the Central Appeals office to demand release of the Tianjin practitioners. It was a very peaceful demonstration and in the end five Falun Gong representatives met with Premier Zhu Rongji, and were given assurances that the Government supported the physical exercises and that Falun Gong was not considered to be anti-establishment.

It was the largest demonstration since the Tiananmen Square protests ten years ago and Jiang was reportedly angered by it. He called for a resolute action to “defeat” Falun Gong. He called this “a political struggle between the Party and its enemies, both at home and abroad, over the [allegiance of the] masses and over the dominant position” ^[26]. He started a new office, formed on June 10, 1999 [hence 6-10 Office], with one goal of defeating Falun Gong. This office reported directly to Jiang and was given the authority to bypass laws, normal examination procedures, approval of funds and personnel. All the seven Politburo members were against this persecution. It was then that Bo Yibo [Bo Xilai’s dad], a very powerful CCP official came in support of Jiang, and Bo’s & Jiang’s fates were intertwined.  

This brutal persecution of members of an organization – with no formal organized structure – has been the bane of CCP since 1999. Jiang made an erroneous assumption that he could defeat Falun Gong in three months. Instead, Falun Gong is still here and still strong. In the preceding years since Tiananmen Square protests, Jiang is alleged to have put down any opposition, writers, and democracy proponents in the name of strengthening the country. But he met his match in this motley group of breathing technique practitioners since they did not oppose the government. They just wanted to improve the mental and physical health of the practitioners, and in the process, urged them to be more truthful.

It is this unlawful persecution that has driven Chinese politics for the past 15 years. It is precisely since it is unlawful that Jiang and his gang don’t want to lose control, lest they be accused of the persecution and face the law. It took Hu Jintao and Xi Jingping close to 15 years to wrest control of China from Jiang Zemin. The pardoning of the former presidents seems to have been broken, since Jiang Zemin is reported to have been arrested ^[14].

In the next part we will see President Xi’s plan for China fits into this grand scheme of things and how India can affect, and is affected by, this particular geopolitical chess board.

Note: All references will be provided at the end of Part 2. https://www.myind.net/decoding-china-puzzle-xi-jingping-relations-india-part-2