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China’s government is engaged in a massive global campaign to promote its communist system and counter dissenting voices, according to a U.S. government report.
After decades of promoting mainly positive narratives about China to world audiences through broadcasting and print media, the ruling Chinese Communist Party has altered its approach under President Xi Jinping, according to the survey, released Thursday by the State Department’s Global Engagement Center.
“Beijing has shifted to embracing the coordinated use of disinformation when it suits its purposes, often using inauthentic bot networks to amplify messaging,” the 58-page report concluded. It describes the operations as highly sophisticated media and government influence “underwritten by billions of dollars in investments.”
The report identifies multiple elements of Chinese government information manipulation and influence activities, including propaganda and censorship, the promotion of “digital authoritarianism” to control online content, and the infiltration and control of international organizations and bilateral relationships.
Jamie Rubin, director of the Global Engagement Center, told reporters that the report comprehensively examines how the People’s Republic of China attempts to distort the global information environment through its influence and disinformation activities.
“When you look at the pieces of the puzzle and you put it all together, you see a breathtaking ambition on the part of the PRC to seek information dominance in key regions of the world,” Mr. Rubin said.
China’s ultimate goal, he said, is to damage the security and stability of the United States and its allies.
Mr. Rubin, a former State Department spokesman, said the information age has produced a “dark side to globalization.” Foreign disinformation and manipulation efforts, unless halted, will slowly and steadily destroy democratic values and rights, he warned.
A Chinese Embassy spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Co-optation
According to the report, the Chinese also are using “co-optation” of former government officials, business people and journalists through bribery to promote false or biased narratives promoted by Beijing.
“Collectively, these elements erode the integrity of the information environment,” the report said.
Disinformation, used in the past as a supporting role in Beijing’s overall foreign policy, has become a central feature of Chinese influence operations. Examples are stories questioning the origin of the COVID-19 virus, criticism of the trilateral U.S.-U.K.-Australian accord on submarine construction, and support of Russia’s justifications for its invasion of Ukraine.
Major disinformation and influence operations defend Chinese policy toward Taiwan and counter what the State Department has called the policy of genocide against minority Uyghurs in western China.
Covert Chinese intelligence personnel have planted false stories in foreign media, and diplomats have pressured foreign media to promote the Chinese regime’s favored narratives. China is also buying foreign media outlets and using them for the operations.
The report warns that Beijing’s efforts are diminishing freedom of expression and manipulating international information outlets into becoming “tools” for Chinese propaganda.
Unless effectively countered, information in the future available to the general public, media, civil society, academia and governments will be distorted and based on false or misleading information from China, the report said.
“This future is not a foregone conclusion,” said the report, noting a growing global consensus for countering the Chinese influence campaign. “The stakes are high: If the PRC’s global narratives ultimately prevail, it will encounter less resistance to reshaping the international order to the detriment of individual liberties and national sovereignty around the world.”
New ‘Long March’
The report reveals that Mr. Xi’s government has launched a “new Long March” to battle what one Chinese Communist Party influencer, Yi Fan, claims are malicious lies in the West about China’s system and policies.
The Long March was the campaign led by Mao Zedong in the 1930s that ultimately led to the communists seizing power in 1949.
The report is the first official U.S. government publication to highlight the work of the ruling Communist Party’s United Front Work Department (UFWD), an overt and covert influence arm engaged in “transnational repression,” mainly against ethnic Chinese living outside China.
According to the report, United Front agents harass and coerce critics of Beijing under the direct control of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, a senior leadership organ.
Mr. Xi has expanded United Front activities, calling them critical for maintaining and increasing Chinese power. “Since coming to power in 2012, he has significantly increased funding for the UFWD and elevated central coordination of its efforts to shape the international environment — including the information domain — to Beijing’s advantage.”
United Front agents also work with the Chinese secret police in the Ministry of State Security. The ministry uses the front as “operational cover” to conduct influence operations, according to the State Department researchers.
The other main organ for the global manipulation campaign is the CCP Central Propaganda Department, said to be exporting domestic information controls to countries around the world.
The UFWD “commands a vast media apparatus that floods overseas Chinese-language spaces with pro-Beijing rhetoric,” the report said.
The Global Engagement Center that produced the report is the U.S. government’s official counterpropaganda office. Most of the center’s previous reports and activities focused on Russian disinformation efforts.
The State Department inspector general last year gave the Global Engagement Center a failing grade for its role in countering disinformation and propaganda. It said the center, which has a staff of 167 people and a $74 million budget, failed to take the lead in governmentwide information activities to expose foreign lies and deception.
According to the inspector general’s report, “the center’s role in countering disinformation was limited to supporting the various U.S. government efforts rather than leading and coordinating a whole-of-government approach as mandated by law.”
The X factor
Chinese officials use more than 333 official and diplomatic accounts on the social media site X to promote disinformation and propaganda. In Britain, a single coordinated network of dozens of accounts produced 44% of all the retweets of the Chinese ambassador to Britain.
The Chinese government paid for a local news outlet in East Africa to publish favorable articles in exchange for cash and with an agreement not to disclose the arrangement, the report said.
China also uses social media influencers to promote its agenda. Nearly 100 people post pro-regime content in two dozen languages, reaching an estimated 11 million people.
“Beijing employs bots, trolls and coordinated campaigns among inauthentic social media accounts to boost pro-PRC content and suppress critical content,” said the report, noting the bots use a technique called “flooding” to manipulate search engine results and hashtag searches.
The result is that Chinese propagandists can drown out online information on topics they oppose and spread unrelated content that limits fact-based information from reaching people.
“Recent PRC flooding campaigns include an attempt to hijack the ‘GenocideGames’ hashtag during the 2022 Winter Olympics to marginalize efforts by foreign activists to raise awareness of the PRC’s genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang,” the report said.
The Chinese use online and real-world intimidation and harassment of critics to silence dissent and encourage self-censorship. Beijing authorities identify and control accounts of online critics domestically and overseas.
U.S. officials have identified how Chinese authorities work with companies in China to identify and locate critics abroad who seek to work anonymously, the report said.
The report said the owner of the popular video-sharing app TikTok, ByteDance, has blocked critics of China from using its platform.
“According to U.S. government information, as of late 2020, ByteDance maintained a regularly updated internal list identifying people who were likely blocked or restricted from all ByteDance platforms, including TikTok, for reasons such as advocating for Uyghur independence,” the report said.
ByteDance also blacklisted people who were viewed as posing risks of spreading criticism of Beijing.
Targeting elites
To further expand its influence, Chinese leaders target foreign political elites — often former political leaders and retired government officials — by offering seats on corporate boards and academic appointments to mute elite criticism of the regime.
China recruited former European and Latin American national leaders to support Mr. Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative, an infrastructure financing program that U.S. officials say has been used to promote the benefits of China’s communist system in the developed world.
China has successfully cultivated foreign journalists to promote pro-Beijing narratives through paid travel to China, professional residencies and graduate education.
Some participants were given “clear instructions from PRC interlocutors about how they should report both during their trips and afterward,” the report said. “Some participants later incorporate PRC talking points into their reporting, enabling Beijing to advance its preferred narratives without direct attribution.”
The hugely popular Chinese messaging app WeChat also is used for propaganda and disinformation, the report said.
“The PRC’s success in exercising control over Chinese-language media is a cautionary harbinger of how its larger efforts could ultimately reshape the global information environment,” the report said.
• Bill Gertz can be reached at bgertz@washingtontimes.com.
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