Chinese Political Warfare: A Strategic Tautology?

[Boats]

Chinese Political Warfare: A Strategic Tautology? The Three Warfares and the Centrality of Political Warfare Within Chinese Strategy

Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked civilian and military students around the world to participate in our seventh annual student writing contest on the subject of strategy.

Now, we are pleased to present the First Place winner from Pieter Zhao, a student at the the Paris School of International Affairs.

[“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” —Sun Tzu]

The United States (U.S.) National Defense Strategy of 2018 prominently stated that the “fundamental” challenge to American national security came from “the re-emergence of long-term strategic competition” by revisionist powers such as Russia, North Korea, and specifically China. It further emphasized that this competition encompassed “all dimensions of power,” with the leadership in Beijing pursuing “efforts short of armed conflict by expanding coercion to new fronts, violating principles of sovereignty, exploiting ambiguity, and deliberately blurring the lines between civil and military goals.”[1] This description tellingly echoes the words of the American diplomat George F. Kennan, who famously characterized the concept of political warfare as “the employment of all the means at a nation’s command, short of war, to achieve its national objectives.”[2] Given Joseph Nye’s insight that conflicts in the 21st-century are increasingly about hearts, minds, and opinions rather than kinetic force, the concept of political warfare has gained renewed attention.[3] The idea that whose narrative wins may be more important than whose army wins rings even more true if one’s rival avoids a kinetic engagement altogether.

Indeed, the main perceived rival of the United States boasts a long strategic tradition in which political warfare is considered central to the art of war, as the opening quote by Sun Tzu illustrates. In fact, the modern iteration of China’s official political and information warfare strategy—the “Three Warfare's” concept—refers directly to Sun Tzu’s strategic legacy, as the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) issued a hundred examples of the Three Warfare's, which cited Sun Tzu thirty times.[4] However, when western observers analyze Chinese political warfare, specifically the Three Warfare's concept, these operations are often considered in their own right, separate from the larger strategic context. Yet, such an approach risks overlooking key dynamics surrounding the Three Warfare's concept, as it should be considered within the larger context of Chinese political warfare and strategic thinking. Accordingly, this paper argues political warfare, specifically the Three Warfare's concept, forms a central element within Chinese strategic thinking, as it directly translates into China’s wider grand strategy and reflects Xi Jinping’s conception of holistic national security. In doing so, the paper will use the South China Sea (SCS) dispute as a case-study and a prominent example of this integrated effort. The first part will consider the concept of political warfare in relation to China’s strategic legacy, followed by an analysis of the conceptualization of the Three Warfare's. Afterward, the case-study of the South China Sea will be considered in order to illustrate the fundamental role of the Three Warfare's, as an instrument of political warfare, within China’s broader grand strategy.

Political Warfare and China’s Strategic Legacy

American officials and policymakers often lament that the West increasingly faces actors employing various asymmetric measures to influence, coerce, intimidate, or undermine its interests.[5] Indeed, such asymmetric measures can be characterized under a concept that is generally not as well-established in western strategic usage and doctrine since the end of the Cold War, but instead became a mere term “that seems useful for describing a spectrum of overt and covert activities designed to support [the accomplishment] of national political-military objectives.”[6] The concept of political warfare is often attributed to George Kennan, who turned Clausewitz’s oft-quoted maxim of “War as the extension of politics by other means” around by postulating that political warfare is “an extension of armed conflict by other means.” In his memorandum titled “The Inauguration of Organized Political Warfare,” Kennan observed:

We have been handicapped… by a popular attachment to the concept of a basic difference between peace and war, by a tendency to view war as a sort of sporting context outside of all political context… and by a reluctance to recognize the realities of international relations, the perpetual rhythm of [struggle, in and out of war].[7]

Following this observation, Kennan postulated the nature of the Soviet threat and defined political warfare as follows:

In broadest definition, political warfare is the employment of all means at a nation’s command, short of war, to achieve its national objectives. Such operations are both overt and covert. They range from such overt actions as political alliances, economic measures… and “white” propaganda to such covert operations as clandestine support of “friendly” foreign elements, “black” psychological warfare, and even encouragement of underground resistance in hostile states.[8]

Kennan’s key observation regarding the “handicapped” position of the west in contrast to the Soviet Union, along with his definition of political warfare, rings as true today in relation to the People’s Republic of China (PRC). As opposed to the western strategic tradition, China’s strategic legacy has a long tradition of blurring the lines between peace and war, dating back to the writings of Sun Tzu. In fact, the Chinese conception of political warfare has further evolved since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) took power, in ways that were not yet fully understood in 1948.

Despite the current emphasis on the PRC’s growing non-kinetic capabilities in the so-called gray-zone between peace and conventional war through the Three Warfares concept, it is essential to consider these concepts within China’s broader strategic context. While the West’s strategic understanding considers political and information warfare operations in relation to activities conducted during military operations, or wartime, the Chinese view considers these operations as a constantly ongoing effort, whether in wartime or peacetime.[9] The origins of this more comprehensive approach can be traced back to China’s strategic legacy, which is underpinned by Sun Tzu’s frequent emphasis on deception and the manipulation of information to undermine the morale of an opposing force to ultimately achieve victory without resorting to kinetic force. China’s ancient strategic texts teach of the importance of deception because it allows China to inhibit its opponents from “fully converting latent into kinetic strength,” thus diminishing an opponent’s “power of resistance.”[10] In modern China, these texts are mandatory educational material for both Chinese officers and enlisted soldiers and sailors. High-ranking officers, such as those in the Central Military Commission, are said to even memorize The Art of War, illustrating its centrality within the Chinese strategic leadership. As a result, despite lacking behind the West in certain military technologies, Chinese strategic thinking can be considered more comprehensive because it includes non-military means through political and information warfare as a fundamental aspect.[11]

Moreover, the roots of the CCP as a revolutionary and clandestine movement have further centralized political warfare within China’s strategic modus operandi. When western observers attempt to explain Chinese political warfare operations through the ill-defined concept of hybrid warfare, they overlook two central elements. First, Chinese political warfare operations are not exclusively conducted by China’s military, security, or intelligence agencies, and second, the importance of political warfare within China’s current strategic environment is primarily defined by the centrality of the CCP.[12] In contrast to western militaries, the PLA is the armed wing of the ruling party, not of the state. Its primary purpose is therefore to create political power in support of the party. Mao Zedong, who often echoed Sun Tzu, specifically instructed his comrades against thinking that “the task of the Red Army…is merely to fight.”[13]

The Chinese Red Army is an armed body for carrying out the political tasks of the revolution…the Red Army fights not merely for the sake of fighting but in order to… help [the masses, i.e., CCP] establish revolutionary political power.[14]

Hence, returning to Kennan’s observation, the CCP has always operated on a basis that does not recognize a clear distinction between peacetime and wartime. Instead, political warfare operations are considered a central aspect in implementing China’s grand strategy, whether it concerned the political tasks of the revolution in 1929 or the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation by 2049. This integrated aspect is further reflected in Xi Jinping’s emphasis on a holistic approach to national security, which combines the western concepts of state security with regime security.[15]

Political Warfare Strategy: The Three Warfares
In line with the centrality of political warfare within Chinese strategic thinking, in which there is no clear distinction between peacetime and wartime, the PLA has developed a flexible political warfare doctrine that serves as a powerful and effective means of leveraging Chinese informational power to gain and maintain influence over both external and internal target audiences.[16] Indeed, echoing Sun Tzu, Chinese military literature stresses the role of the Three Warfares in subduing an enemy without fighting or ensuring victory when a conflict erupts. Accordingly, the Three Warfares concept is not only emblematic of Chinese political warfare but also provides the modern operational implementation. [17]

Although the concept only emerged in 2003, its contents can be traced back decades within the PLA’s lexicon. Indeed, from the start of the Chinese revolution, the CCP continuously sought to exploit foreign contacts and audiences to shape the narrative of the revolution, gain support, and discredit adversaries.[18] Moreover, the content of the Three Warfares is consistent with guidelines issued to the PLA’s Political Work Department since at least 1963, which directed:

Give full play to the combat function of political work: organize public opinion warfare, psychological warfare, and legal warfare; do a good job of disintegrating the enemy’s activity; and prevent the enemy’s efforts to incite discord.[19]

Additionally, external stimuli also influenced the development of the Three Warfares concept. These include the lessons learned by the Chinese strategic leadership following their analyses of American military activities in Iraq, Yugoslavia, and Afghanistan between 1991 and 2003. For instance, the U.S. mobilization of Congress, the United Nations, and NATO in formulating the legal right to use force, in combination with its efforts to shape domestic and international public opinion through media outlets, and psychological warfare activities to undermine the morale of Iraqi troops—had important effects on Chinese thinking at the strategic, technological, and operational levels.[20] These observations further confirmed the idea that non-military operations and non-kinetic capabilities were central to contemporary conflicts. Accordingly, this observation eventually became conceptualized under the rubric of “unrestricted warfare,” which was introduced in a publication by two high-ranking PLA officers in 1999. The book sought to address the question of how a technologically inferior nation such as China could engage a superior adversary (such as the United States) by arguing that contemporary warfare should not merely be characterized by using “armed forces to compel the enemy to submit to one’s will,” but rather by using “all means, including armed force or non-armed force, military and non-military, and lethal and non-lethal means to compel the enemy to accept one’s interests.”[21] Moreover, the authors emphasized that “all boundaries lying between the two worlds of war and non-war, of military and non-military, should be totally removed” to conduct unrestricted warfare successfully.[22] This is a view that largely coincides with Kennan’s definition of political warfare.

These assessments collectively fed into the development of China’s official conception or strategy of political warfare, which the Central Military Commission officially introduced in 2003 as the Three Warfare's. The Three Warfare's provides the PLA with a dynamic, flexible, and nuanced strategic approach to political and information warfare operations consisting of three interconnected elements:

Public Opinion or Media Warfare,

Psychological Warfare, and

Legal Warfare or Lawfare.[23]

Collectively, these elements are intended to control the prevailing discourse and influence perceptions to advance China’s interests while undermining the capability of adversaries to respond. According to official Chinese guidelines, they are designed to seize the “decisive opportunity” for controlling public opinion, organize psychological offense and defense, engage in legal struggle, and fight for popular will and public opinion. Accordingly, the Three Warfare's encourages efforts to unify military and civilian thinking, divide the enemy into factions, weaken the enemy’s combat power, and organize legal offensives.[24] Yet, the execution of the Three Warfare's is not limited to the PLA, as a range of organizations across both the party and the state perform various functions to contribute to China’s political warfare strategy.

For instance, the Ministry of Education surveils, organizes, and rallies Chinese students on both domestic and international university campuses; the United Front Work Department mobilizes overseas Chinese to support friendly politicians and official narratives; the Ministry of State Security uses think tanks to present official lines in appealing ways while conducting covert operations; and China’s propaganda apparatus mobilizes overseas Chinese-language media to extend Beijing’s reach.[25] Hence, if the U.S. Navy hypothetically attempted to gain port access in a particular country, for instance, China would implement the Three Warfare's by mobilizing its considerable organizational infrastructure to adversely influence public opinion (e.g., through media channels), exert psychological pressure (e.g., by threatening with boycotts), and mount legal challenges (e.g., through the UN General Assembly)—all intended to render the environment unwelcoming to American objectives.[26] As a result, the Three Warfare's reflects China’s strategic legacy that considers war as not simply a military struggle but as a more comprehensive engagement proceeding in the political, economic, diplomatic, and legal domains as well.[27]

Case-Study: The Three Warfare's in the South China Sea

This section considers the case-study of the dispute in the South China Sea to further analyze how the Three Warfare's forms a fundamental element within China’s broader strategic context as an instrument of political warfare. According to the Introduction to Public Opinion Warfare, Psychological Warfare, and Legal Warfare published by China’s National Defense University in 2014, the execution of the Three Warfare's should be guided by certain basic principles. These principles stress the integration of national-political and diplomatic struggles revolving around the launching of military operations, rapidly taking advantage of the decisive opportunity, engaging in offense and defense, emphasizing offense, and the integrating peace and war.[28] These principles suggest a highly integrated approach involving proactive peacetime operations to enable China to rapidly seize the initiative in the event of a conflict or crisis while simultaneously advancing its interests during peacetime. Hence, the Three Warfare's can be considered as how Chinese leadership conceptualized the various political warfare operations intended to shape the environment in which the PLA operates.[29]

The dispute in the South China Sea can be considered part of China’s broader maritime strategy, which seeks to build China into a “great maritime power,” as stated by former president Hu Jintao during the CCP’s 18th Party Congress.[30] According to Hu, becoming a maritime power is fundamental to achieving China’s national objectives, a view that has been emphasized further by Xi Jinping, who includes maritime power as an essential element of the “Chinese Dream” of “National Rejuvenation.”[31] The consolidation of Chinese claims within the disputed waters of the South China Sea is therefore considered vital for its abundant resources and the security of China’s sea lines of communication, contributing to its national security. As a result, China has engaged in a strategy of so-called salami-slicing that pursues repetitive but limited faits accomplish to gradually expand influence within a local context while avoiding potential escalation. This basic notion—gaining ground slice by slice instead of all at once—manifests itself in Chinese operations in the South China Sea.[32] For example, China has gradually consolidated its control by constructing artificial islands and establishing military installations, sending maritime militia and coast guard vessels on patrol in contested waters, and declaring air defense identification zones.[33] In pursuit of this strategy, China has mobilized its complete organizational infrastructure of political and information warfare means, in line with the Three Warfare's concept, to achieve its greater geostrategic objectives.

As an instrument of political warfare, the Three Warfare's provides valuable options for China to in pursuit of its grand strategic interests while simultaneously preventing escalation into conventional conflicts. When looking at psychological warfare—which aims to influence, confuse, and/or intimidate foreign decision-makers to facilitate acquiescence to Chinese-desired outcomes—the Chinese ambiguity regarding the definition of the South China Sea as a core interest provides a telling example.[34] Following the U.S.-China Joint Statement released in 2009—which included the statement that “the two sides agreed that respecting each other’s core interests is extremely important to ensure steady progress in U.S.-China relations”—China disseminated conflicting narratives regarding whether or not the South China Sea constituted a core interest, as opposed to its sovereignty claims to Taiwan, Tibet, and Xinjiang for example.[35] According to an official Pentagon report, this behavior can be considered an attempt to “manipulate perception and psychology to condition the operational environment in China’s favor,” which contributed to China’s probing behavior aimed at gauging the opposing state’s power and will to maintain security and influence over a region.[36] In doing so, China practically conveys to the hegemon that supporting the regional status quo is no longer cost-free while avoiding significant escalation and simultaneously generating regional doubt concerning U.S. commitments and capabilities.[37] Additionally, the deployment of maritime militia vessels reinforcing its claims causes further confusion amongst regional states, as they are uncertain how to respond adequately.

Consequently, to reinforce its claims and the psychological impact, Chinese lawfare efforts have involved the exploitation of domestic and international legal systems in claiming the legal high ground, asserting legitimacy, and constraining the operational freedom of adversaries. These activities have included claims of de jure sovereignty based on historical titles, such as Zheng He’s 15th-century voyages, or post-1945 arguments stressing Japan’s forceful annexation of Chinese claims in the South China Sea, which should consequently be returned to China; and assertions that the artificially created islands in the South China Sea constitute extensions of Chinese territory, such as the village of Sansha on the disputed Paracel Islands.[38] Internationally, China surprised the UN General Assembly in 2014 by presenting a position paper on its maritime dispute with Vietnam, which was replete with selected references to international law in support of China’s position.[39] Finally, China’s psychological and legal warfare activities have been further augmented with various efforts that seek to influence global and domestic public opinion to support China’s objectives while discrediting diverging narratives and dissuading contrary actions.[40] Central themes within such media warfare include items that emphasize the historical validity of China’s claims, the humiliating loss of Chinese territories due to the century of humiliation, and the selective disregard of international law as a tool of imperialism.[41] Overseas-oriented media channels, such as the Global Times, People’s Daily, and Xinhua often push a similar narrative with an extra emphasis on the responsibility of the U.S., Japan, Vietnam, and the Philippines, among others, in aggravating the regional tensions and their lack of respect for Chinese law.[42] In doing so, the Three Warfare's practically enable and facilitate China’s consolidation activities in the South China Sea, which are, in turn, continuously in support of—and integrated within—China’s broader grand strategy.

Conclusion
All told, by looking at the development of the Three Warfares concept and its implementation in the context of disputes in the South China Sea, it becomes clear that China does not merely conduct political warfare in pursuit of various individual geostrategic objectives. Rather, it is fundamentally integrated within China’s broader maritime strategy, which, in turn, translates into China’s grand strategy of national rejuvenation. This deduction is further underpinned by China’s long strategic legacy, which firmly resembles Kennan’s definition of political warfare. Chinese political warfare should, therefore, not be considered separate from the larger strategic context because China’s conception of national strategy incorporates all levers of “comprehensive national power,” as defined by Xi Jinping himself, leading to the symbolic characterization of Chinese political warfare as a strategic tautology, as political warfare seems fundamentally inherent within Chinese strategic thinking.

Following this assessment of political warfare as a systematically incorporated aspect within Chinese military thinking, it remains to be seen how its synthetic integration with conventional military operations will play out. In practice, this would involve attempts to take advantage of the previously established peacetime operations—implemented through the Three Warfares—to ultimately develop favorable conditions to seize the initiative and go on the offensive. Thus, as China has already demonstrated its efficacy concerning the political dimension of geostrategic competition, a better understanding of the integration of the Three Warfares will continue to have immediate and real-world relevance for both the stability within the South China Sea and the Indo-Pacific region at large.

Pieter W.G. Zhao is a graduate student in International Security at the Paris School of International Affairs at Sciences Po, Paris. He also holds a BA and MA (Cum Laude) in History specialized in maritime history and international relations from the Erasmus University in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. His research interests include Geostrategy, Maritime Security, and the Indo-Pacific region.

This article appeared originally at Strategy Bridge.
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Personal note: It seems somebody took a lot of time to present their position of warfare.
The Chinese have done a lot of this at late - looking for a positive result or advantage
on its enemies.
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Let's hope our People are also considering such an event. Regardless the next war will
be the ultimate of weapons displays and end results. Who knows? The End of Days
could result and leave our world in total contamination?
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