Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine at the latest – and its consequences like the impending gas shortage – Germany has also become increasingly aware of its dependencies on China. Foreign Minister Baerbock and Economics Minister Habeck want to chart a new course. And German companies are also beginning to rethink their position. The problem is that breaking away from Russia is already difficult, but in the case of China, it will be a real Herculean task. Germany’s dependencies on China are much larger and complex.
Nico Beckert analyzes where German dependencies are most significant – and why the much-cited “decoupling” will not be an easy solution. Since China also wants to become less dependent on Germany, he draws the conclusion: A turning point is approaching.
Meanwhile, Taiwan is on alert – literally. David Demes shows what this means for the people in Taiwan and how the country is preparing for an emergency: On Monday, sirens were howling and people were forced into bunkers – across the nation, protective measures were being practiced for a Chinese missile attack.
Taiwan’s military is also holding the Han Kuang maneuver. More than 20 ships and aircraft train for an emergency: An attack by the People’s Republic of China. In any case, the words of Taipei’s mayor are thought-provoking. “It is necessary to make preparations for the event of a war,” Ko Wen-je said on Monday.
For years, China was considered one of the preferred partners of German politics and business. The People’s Republic was a guarantor of German growth and has long since risen to become Germany’s largest trading partner. Automobile and mechanical engineering companies make huge profits in the People’s Republic.
However, there are many indications that Germany’s economic involvement in China is facing a turning point. The Covid lockdowns and the Chinese focus on their own competitiveness are making the country increasingly unattractive.
Added to this is the new fear of becoming too dependent: Germany’s gas dependence on Russia is likely to lead to a recession this winter. Against this backdrop, Germany’s dependence on China is also being reassessed. Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock recently said she was “very serious” about reducing dependencies on China.
It won’t be easy. “Europe’s economic ties with China are much more complex” than those with Russia “and involve sectors with a deeply ramified value chain,” Max Zenglein, Chief Economist at China think tank Merics, tells China.Table.
There are even critical dependencies on rare earth elements, magnesium, and other raw materials (China.Table reported). Dependencies have also increased sharply for industrial goods. According to Merics, EU states are in a “critical strategic dependence” on China in 103 product categories. This means that EU members import at least 50 percent of a given product from China, and the People’s Republic also has a global market share of at least 30 percent. These include, for example, pharmaceutical products, chemicals, and electronic parts such as specific circuit boards, small transformers, and battery cells. Numerous industries rely on intermediate inputs from China.
Finding other suppliers for all these products at short notice would be problematic. The German economy could hardly cope with a supply stoppage. Zenglein, therefore, recommends: “It would be quite helpful if politics and business were to adopt mechanisms to identify dependencies and reduce them in critical areas – for example, renewable energies, basic pharmaceutical materials or electronic components.”
China is already doing that. Beijing aims to become the world’s technological leader and overtake Western suppliers. China’s companies are to become more innovative and establish tech dominance, which will ensure future growth. “In the event of geopolitical escalations,” China would then be better equipped, says Zenglein.
To catch up technologically, China is also using foreign corporations. As a result, some researchers warn that the German industry should not act too naively. “Foreign investors must realize that they are supposed to serve this goal,” Rolf Langhammer of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel) tells China.Table. The automotive industry would serve as a cautionary example. German companies “have supplied Chinese companies with the necessary know-how to be replaced by them in the future,” explains the trade expert.
A study by the Institute of the German Economy in Cologne (IW) shows the consequences: “Germany is much more dependent on China, especially on the export side, but also on the import side than vice versa.” And China’s imports will continue to decline in the future, the prognosis shows. The reason can be found in Beijing. “The Chinese government wants to further reduce its dependencies on foreign countries through the dual-circulation strategy,” writes the study’s author, Juergen Matthes.
However, not all developments are the result of an active decision by Beijing. China has recently become less attractive as a sales market and in day-to-day business. Companies and associations complain about the strict zero-Covid policy and numerous lockdowns. According to a survey by the EU Chamber of Commerce in China, an increasingly large number of companies consider withdrawing investments from China (China.Table reported). For 77 percent of the companies surveyed, China has lost its appeal as an investment target.
And German companies also want to reduce their dependence on China. Almost every second industrial company that purchases intermediate inputs from the People’s Republic wants to reduce its imports from the country, as an Ifo study from April shows. Whether this change in sentiment will also “trigger a fundamental change in strategy among European companies remains to be seen,” says Zenglein.
But globally, the signs are pointing toward disentanglement. “Globalization is at the beginning of a realignment,” says Zenglein. Risk factors will have to play an increasing role in companies’ calculations in the future. However, the idea is not to decouple. Rather, Zenglein advocates diversification. It “will take time and, above all, money.”
Rolf Langhammer points out that the Chinese market is still too vital at present. “Companies will only be able to reduce their focus on the Chinese market very slowly, if at all,” says the IfW researcher. But against the backdrop of the new geopolitical realities, “it may become even more costly not to react,” says Zenglein.
This could be the biggest challenge. Companies prefer to focus on short-term profits rather than long-term security. After all, they compete with each other. It’s the classic prisoner’s dilemma: If a company gives up sales in China, opportunities open up for competitors, who then can fill the gap and take market share from the company. The same applies to purchasing low-cost primary products and raw materials from China. But whether this approach will bring significant benefits in the long term is questionable, especially since the Russia debacle.
Will German politics and business learn the right lessons and adapt to the new globalization? A new China strategy by the Foreign Ministry could soon shed light on this. Foreign Minister Baerbock recently said that because China is a system rival, “we have to make clear that nobody can blackmail us, as we were with our gas dependency on Russia.” And Robert Habeck also wants to chart a new course. “We are diversifying more and reducing our dependencies, including on China,” the Economic Affairs Minister said recently. The government will have to be measured against these statements.
On Monday, the sirens sounded in Taiwan’s capital Taipei in the early afternoon – as a test. Within minutes, life had disappeared from the streets. People hurriedly to bunkers and basements to practice an incoming air attack. For about 30 minutes, the streets were eerily deserted. Then it all ended, and public life in Taiwan resumed its usual course.
Fleeing to the bunkers is part of the annual Wan An (萬安演習) civil defense drill in Taiwan. Participation has been mandatory for many years because the fear of a Chinese attack on the island is omnipresent. The authorities test their alarm system annually: Sirens and messages to people’s cell phones are intended to help every citizen to get to safety.
President Tsai Ing-wen reminded her fellow citizens as a precaution that no one should panic and behave as instructed when the drill begins. Because this year, Wan An is under a special star.
Rarely in recent decades has the threat of war in Taiwan seemed as realistic as it does now. Especially since the announcement by Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives, about her intention to visit the island in August sparked massive threats from Beijing (China.Table reported). The Chinese government sees Taiwan as an inseparable part of its territory and wants to integrate the island state into the People’s Republic – by force if necessary.
“It is necessary to make preparations in the event of a war,” Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je said. “Chinese military planes have frequently harassed Taiwan in recent years and there’s even the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war in February, these incidents remind us that we need to be vigilant in peace time,” Ko warned.
When the warning sirens began to wail in many parts of northern Taiwan at around 1:30 PM local time, trains, subways, buses, as well as every cab, had to stop passenger transport immediately. In Taipei, for the first time, all motorists had to leave their vehicles and seek shelter in the nearest bunker. Those who ignored the alarm faced a fine of up to NT$150,000, equivalent to almost €5,000. People indoors were urged to close all windows, turn off light sources and assume a protective pose.
“As the capital, Taipei will bear the brunt of the attack in the event of an air strike. We hope that the public’s crisis awareness will be heightened by the exercise and that citizens will understand that war requires some preparation,” the Taipei Transport Authority informs.
The island wants to be able to react optimally in case of an emergency. Civil defense is therefore only part of the annual exercises. The traditional military maneuver Han Kuang (漢光演習) has also started this week. It is reported that, since Monday, “maintaining combat power and air defense” have been intensively trained. This will be followed by “joint interception maneuvers” by the Army, Navy, and Air Force starting on Wednesday, which is to simulate the landing of enemy troops from the air and on the coast. For “joint territorial defense,” a counterattack will also be practiced on Thursday and Friday.
According to the military, this year’s priorities are “maintaining combat power, involving the population in supporting the troops, strengthening control over maritime areas and territorial defense.” The goal is to intercept and eliminate attacking forces while they are still on potential attack routes.
In a simulated Chinese attack on the main island’s west coast, fighter jets leave their bases to the east. Spare parts for the aircraft are also to be flown out by transport aircraft to maintain repair capacities. To prevent an attack on ships in port, minesweepers are to create a safe corridor, and the Navy is then to move their ships to safety on the high seas.
During the theoretical part of the maneuver in May, simulation exercises had already been conducted for civilian defense, i.e., the use of civilians to support the military. Lessons are to be learned from the Ukraine war to improve asymmetric and cognitive warfare as well as electronic warfare, Major General Lin Wen-huang told PTS News. He also said the reserve’s combat capabilities should be improved. For the first time, reservists who have undergone the new 14-day refresher training will participate in the Han Kuang maneuver (China.Table reported).
Big guns are raised off the coast of Su’ao (蘇澳) in northeast Taiwan. There, the air force and navy are to conduct joint exercises involving more than 20 ships and aircraft. President Tsai is expected to observe the maneuver aboard a missile destroyer.
State media in the People’s Republic regularly ridicule Taiwan’s annual military maneuvers as a political stunt aimed only at evoking a “Chinese threat” and securing even more military support from the United States. China’s military nevertheless appears to have a keen interest in the maneuver. Japanese and Taiwanese media unanimously report that a Chinese spy ship was sighted in the area around northeast Taiwan in the run-up to the maneuver.
China’s civil society, meanwhile, is not permitted to discuss the military exercises in Taiwan. On Sunday, searches for “Han Kuang maneuver” and “maneuver” on the Chinese microblogging service Weibo came up empty. The Han Kuang maneuver has been practiced since 1984. Its predecessors were the joint military maneuvers with the American military advisers of the “Military Assistance Advisory Group” (MAAG) stationed in Taiwan until 1979.
After becoming the Communist Party of China’s chief of Xinjiang Province in 2016, Chen Quanguo oversaw a security crackdown that led to a drop in births so sharp that it shocked the world. Some observers accused China’s leadership of committing genocide against the province’s mostly Muslim Uyghur population through forced sterilization and abortion. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi dismissed the allegations as “fake news,” arguing that Xinjiang’s Uyghur population had grown steadily to 12.7 million in 2018, an increase of 25% from 2010 – and higher than the 14 percent increase in the province’s total population.
But recently released 2020 census figures have delivered what amounts to a slap in the foreign ministry’s face. The data show that in 2020, Xinjiang’s Uyghur population had grown by only 16% since 2010, to 11.6 million, compared to a 19% increase in Xinjiang’s total population. Even more shocking, the Uyghur population aged 0-4 was only 36 percent the size of that aged 5-9.
The only comparable case occurred in Shandong Province in the early 1990s, when some party cadres tried to launch a campaign to be “free of newborns in 100 days.” In 2000, the number of five- to nine-year-olds in Tai’an City was only 28 percent of the number of ten- to 14-year-olds. And in 1980, when the Chinese authorities were discussing the one-child policy, there was even a creepy proposal to introduce a “newborn-free year” every few years.The only comparable antecedent to this plunge in births was in Shandong Province in the early 1990s, where some Party officials tried to launch a campaign to go “newborn-free in 100 days.” By 2000, the population of 5-9 year olds in Tai’an, a city in Shandong, was only 28 percent the size of the cohort aged 10-14. Back in 1980, when Chinese authorities were discussing the one-child policy, there was even a creepy proposal to have a “newborn-free year” every few years.
To understand why Xinjiang’s births have plummeted, it helps to review the history of population control in the province. China implemented family planning nationwide in 1973 and imposed the one-child policy in 1980. But for ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, family planning came later. Starting in 1989, minority urban couples in Xinjiang were allowed two children. Rural couples were allowed two as well, and were less likely to be forced to have abortions and sterilizations. Those “lenient” policies, combined with lagging education, led to higher fertility rates among Uyghurs. For example, the national fertility rates in 1989, 2000, and 2010 were 2.3, 1.22, and 1.18 children per woman, respectively, and 4.31, 2.0, and 1.84 for Uyghur women.
Chen’s predecessor Zhang Chunxian, who was party secretary of Hunan Province between 2005 and 2010, strongly advocated population control. Under the slogan, “to regulate family planning is to regulate productivity,” he launched a campaign to this effect in Hunan in 2006. This also affected my cousin by marriage, who was forced to have an abortion a few days before the birth of her first child because she had not applied for her birth permit in time.Chen’s predecessor, Zhang Chunxian, was keen on population control when he was CPC secretary of Hunan Province from 2005 to 2010. Arguing that “to grasp family planning is to grasp productivity,” he launched a campaign to strengthen family planning in Hunan in 2006. The campaign swept up my cousin-in-law, who was forced to abort her first child a few days before her due date because she had not applied for a birth permit in time.
In 2010, Zhang was reassigned to Xinjiang, and Hunan’s new governor, Xu Shousheng, arrived with plans to launch another campaign to strengthen population control in the province. In January 2011, I posted an “Open Letter to the Secretary and Governor of Hunan on Family Planning” online, euphemistically criticizing Zhang and Xu. In response, the Hunan authorities invited me to lecture on the topic in Hunan, and Ilham Tohti, a Uyghur economist and award-winning human-rights defender, joined me in calling for an end to family planning for the Uyghurs.
Then, on July 31, 2014, Zhang published an essay in the CPC journal Seeking Truth, arguing that Xinjiang must “implement a family-planning policy that is equal for all ethnic groups” and must “lower and stabilize fertility at a moderate level.” I was so concerned that in March 2015, I published a peer-reviewed response in the journal Population and Society, entitled “The urgency of stopping population control in view of the low fertility rates of ethnic minorities.”
In the event, Zhang did not strengthen family planning in Xinjiang. Births in the province remained stable during his tenure. But we now know that, under Chen’s rule, births plummeted from 389,695 in 2017 to 267,250 in 2018, and to 159,528 in 2021, implying three-quarters of a million fewer births in 2018-21.
Since Chinese authorities have long been notorious for mandating abortion, sterilization, and intrauterine devices, it is natural to assume that the dramatic decline in births in Xinjiang reflects such measures. But matters are not so simple, because there were slightly fewer abortions and IUDs in Xinjiang in 2017-20 than in 2013-16; and though there were 70,000 more sterilizations, that figure is still an order of magnitude smaller than the drop in births.
Given that couples in Xinjiang can legally have two or three children, it is unlikely that the authorities systematically forced abortions, ligations, and IUDs on women who had only one or two children. Why, then, was the Uyghur fertility rate in 2020 only one child per woman? Most likely, it is because Chen’s brutal crackdown both undermined Uyghur fertility habits (under the pretext of fighting Islamic extremism) and reduced the resources for parenting, through economic recession and rising unemployment. As rural Xinjiang suffered severe cultural repression and economic deprivation, the fertility rate in 2020 fell to an unusually low level compared to the province’s urban areas.
Moreover, improved education has also contributed partly to the decline in births, by leading more women to delay marriage and childbearing. Chinese authorities have invested heavily to provide 15 years of free compulsory education in Xinjiang, compared with nine years nationwide. As a result, Xinjiang’s high-school gross enrollment rate increased from 69% in 2010 to 99% in 2020, while the nationwide rate rose from 83% to just 91 percent. Uyghurs have suffered from forced sterilization, of course. But it is this forced cultural shift that appears to have had more serious consequences for the birth rate.
While the Chinese authorities have been very effective at lowering fertility rates, they have proved to be far less competent at boosting them. The recent “two-child” and “three-child” policies have both been abject failures. Looking ahead, every effort to encourage procreation in Xinjiang will fail if the region’s socioeconomic vitality continues to decline.
This failure will cause China to lose its geopolitical advantage in Central Asia, where it is in a struggle for influence with Russia. China’s rulers have heaped praise on Chen, but they have yet to recognize that his security crackdown in Xinjiang sowed the seeds of severe long-term problems. These failures will cause China to lose its geopolitical advantages in Central Asia, where it is vying with Russia for influence. Chinese rulers have praised Chen massively, but have yet to understand that his crackdown in Xinjiang has set the stage for severe long-term problems.
Yi Fuxian, a senior scientist in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is the author of Big Country with an Empty Nest (China Development Press, 2013).
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2022.
www.project-syndicate.org
Members of a research expedition to Tibetan settlement areas in Qinghai have been studying the ecological conditions of the Yangtze and Lancang river headwaters since Sunday. The experts from the Changjiang River Scientific Research Institute (CRSRI) are interested in hydrology, soil erosion, glaciers, and permafrost in the region, among other things.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine at the latest – and its consequences like the impending gas shortage – Germany has also become increasingly aware of its dependencies on China. Foreign Minister Baerbock and Economics Minister Habeck want to chart a new course. And German companies are also beginning to rethink their position. The problem is that breaking away from Russia is already difficult, but in the case of China, it will be a real Herculean task. Germany’s dependencies on China are much larger and complex.
Nico Beckert analyzes where German dependencies are most significant – and why the much-cited “decoupling” will not be an easy solution. Since China also wants to become less dependent on Germany, he draws the conclusion: A turning point is approaching.
Meanwhile, Taiwan is on alert – literally. David Demes shows what this means for the people in Taiwan and how the country is preparing for an emergency: On Monday, sirens were howling and people were forced into bunkers – across the nation, protective measures were being practiced for a Chinese missile attack.
Taiwan’s military is also holding the Han Kuang maneuver. More than 20 ships and aircraft train for an emergency: An attack by the People’s Republic of China. In any case, the words of Taipei’s mayor are thought-provoking. “It is necessary to make preparations for the event of a war,” Ko Wen-je said on Monday.
For years, China was considered one of the preferred partners of German politics and business. The People’s Republic was a guarantor of German growth and has long since risen to become Germany’s largest trading partner. Automobile and mechanical engineering companies make huge profits in the People’s Republic.
However, there are many indications that Germany’s economic involvement in China is facing a turning point. The Covid lockdowns and the Chinese focus on their own competitiveness are making the country increasingly unattractive.
Added to this is the new fear of becoming too dependent: Germany’s gas dependence on Russia is likely to lead to a recession this winter. Against this backdrop, Germany’s dependence on China is also being reassessed. Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock recently said she was “very serious” about reducing dependencies on China.
It won’t be easy. “Europe’s economic ties with China are much more complex” than those with Russia “and involve sectors with a deeply ramified value chain,” Max Zenglein, Chief Economist at China think tank Merics, tells China.Table.
There are even critical dependencies on rare earth elements, magnesium, and other raw materials (China.Table reported). Dependencies have also increased sharply for industrial goods. According to Merics, EU states are in a “critical strategic dependence” on China in 103 product categories. This means that EU members import at least 50 percent of a given product from China, and the People’s Republic also has a global market share of at least 30 percent. These include, for example, pharmaceutical products, chemicals, and electronic parts such as specific circuit boards, small transformers, and battery cells. Numerous industries rely on intermediate inputs from China.
Finding other suppliers for all these products at short notice would be problematic. The German economy could hardly cope with a supply stoppage. Zenglein, therefore, recommends: “It would be quite helpful if politics and business were to adopt mechanisms to identify dependencies and reduce them in critical areas – for example, renewable energies, basic pharmaceutical materials or electronic components.”
China is already doing that. Beijing aims to become the world’s technological leader and overtake Western suppliers. China’s companies are to become more innovative and establish tech dominance, which will ensure future growth. “In the event of geopolitical escalations,” China would then be better equipped, says Zenglein.
To catch up technologically, China is also using foreign corporations. As a result, some researchers warn that the German industry should not act too naively. “Foreign investors must realize that they are supposed to serve this goal,” Rolf Langhammer of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel) tells China.Table. The automotive industry would serve as a cautionary example. German companies “have supplied Chinese companies with the necessary know-how to be replaced by them in the future,” explains the trade expert.
A study by the Institute of the German Economy in Cologne (IW) shows the consequences: “Germany is much more dependent on China, especially on the export side, but also on the import side than vice versa.” And China’s imports will continue to decline in the future, the prognosis shows. The reason can be found in Beijing. “The Chinese government wants to further reduce its dependencies on foreign countries through the dual-circulation strategy,” writes the study’s author, Juergen Matthes.
However, not all developments are the result of an active decision by Beijing. China has recently become less attractive as a sales market and in day-to-day business. Companies and associations complain about the strict zero-Covid policy and numerous lockdowns. According to a survey by the EU Chamber of Commerce in China, an increasingly large number of companies consider withdrawing investments from China (China.Table reported). For 77 percent of the companies surveyed, China has lost its appeal as an investment target.
And German companies also want to reduce their dependence on China. Almost every second industrial company that purchases intermediate inputs from the People’s Republic wants to reduce its imports from the country, as an Ifo study from April shows. Whether this change in sentiment will also “trigger a fundamental change in strategy among European companies remains to be seen,” says Zenglein.
But globally, the signs are pointing toward disentanglement. “Globalization is at the beginning of a realignment,” says Zenglein. Risk factors will have to play an increasing role in companies’ calculations in the future. However, the idea is not to decouple. Rather, Zenglein advocates diversification. It “will take time and, above all, money.”
Rolf Langhammer points out that the Chinese market is still too vital at present. “Companies will only be able to reduce their focus on the Chinese market very slowly, if at all,” says the IfW researcher. But against the backdrop of the new geopolitical realities, “it may become even more costly not to react,” says Zenglein.
This could be the biggest challenge. Companies prefer to focus on short-term profits rather than long-term security. After all, they compete with each other. It’s the classic prisoner’s dilemma: If a company gives up sales in China, opportunities open up for competitors, who then can fill the gap and take market share from the company. The same applies to purchasing low-cost primary products and raw materials from China. But whether this approach will bring significant benefits in the long term is questionable, especially since the Russia debacle.
Will German politics and business learn the right lessons and adapt to the new globalization? A new China strategy by the Foreign Ministry could soon shed light on this. Foreign Minister Baerbock recently said that because China is a system rival, “we have to make clear that nobody can blackmail us, as we were with our gas dependency on Russia.” And Robert Habeck also wants to chart a new course. “We are diversifying more and reducing our dependencies, including on China,” the Economic Affairs Minister said recently. The government will have to be measured against these statements.
On Monday, the sirens sounded in Taiwan’s capital Taipei in the early afternoon – as a test. Within minutes, life had disappeared from the streets. People hurriedly to bunkers and basements to practice an incoming air attack. For about 30 minutes, the streets were eerily deserted. Then it all ended, and public life in Taiwan resumed its usual course.
Fleeing to the bunkers is part of the annual Wan An (萬安演習) civil defense drill in Taiwan. Participation has been mandatory for many years because the fear of a Chinese attack on the island is omnipresent. The authorities test their alarm system annually: Sirens and messages to people’s cell phones are intended to help every citizen to get to safety.
President Tsai Ing-wen reminded her fellow citizens as a precaution that no one should panic and behave as instructed when the drill begins. Because this year, Wan An is under a special star.
Rarely in recent decades has the threat of war in Taiwan seemed as realistic as it does now. Especially since the announcement by Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives, about her intention to visit the island in August sparked massive threats from Beijing (China.Table reported). The Chinese government sees Taiwan as an inseparable part of its territory and wants to integrate the island state into the People’s Republic – by force if necessary.
“It is necessary to make preparations in the event of a war,” Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je said. “Chinese military planes have frequently harassed Taiwan in recent years and there’s even the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war in February, these incidents remind us that we need to be vigilant in peace time,” Ko warned.
When the warning sirens began to wail in many parts of northern Taiwan at around 1:30 PM local time, trains, subways, buses, as well as every cab, had to stop passenger transport immediately. In Taipei, for the first time, all motorists had to leave their vehicles and seek shelter in the nearest bunker. Those who ignored the alarm faced a fine of up to NT$150,000, equivalent to almost €5,000. People indoors were urged to close all windows, turn off light sources and assume a protective pose.
“As the capital, Taipei will bear the brunt of the attack in the event of an air strike. We hope that the public’s crisis awareness will be heightened by the exercise and that citizens will understand that war requires some preparation,” the Taipei Transport Authority informs.
The island wants to be able to react optimally in case of an emergency. Civil defense is therefore only part of the annual exercises. The traditional military maneuver Han Kuang (漢光演習) has also started this week. It is reported that, since Monday, “maintaining combat power and air defense” have been intensively trained. This will be followed by “joint interception maneuvers” by the Army, Navy, and Air Force starting on Wednesday, which is to simulate the landing of enemy troops from the air and on the coast. For “joint territorial defense,” a counterattack will also be practiced on Thursday and Friday.
According to the military, this year’s priorities are “maintaining combat power, involving the population in supporting the troops, strengthening control over maritime areas and territorial defense.” The goal is to intercept and eliminate attacking forces while they are still on potential attack routes.
In a simulated Chinese attack on the main island’s west coast, fighter jets leave their bases to the east. Spare parts for the aircraft are also to be flown out by transport aircraft to maintain repair capacities. To prevent an attack on ships in port, minesweepers are to create a safe corridor, and the Navy is then to move their ships to safety on the high seas.
During the theoretical part of the maneuver in May, simulation exercises had already been conducted for civilian defense, i.e., the use of civilians to support the military. Lessons are to be learned from the Ukraine war to improve asymmetric and cognitive warfare as well as electronic warfare, Major General Lin Wen-huang told PTS News. He also said the reserve’s combat capabilities should be improved. For the first time, reservists who have undergone the new 14-day refresher training will participate in the Han Kuang maneuver (China.Table reported).
Big guns are raised off the coast of Su’ao (蘇澳) in northeast Taiwan. There, the air force and navy are to conduct joint exercises involving more than 20 ships and aircraft. President Tsai is expected to observe the maneuver aboard a missile destroyer.
State media in the People’s Republic regularly ridicule Taiwan’s annual military maneuvers as a political stunt aimed only at evoking a “Chinese threat” and securing even more military support from the United States. China’s military nevertheless appears to have a keen interest in the maneuver. Japanese and Taiwanese media unanimously report that a Chinese spy ship was sighted in the area around northeast Taiwan in the run-up to the maneuver.
China’s civil society, meanwhile, is not permitted to discuss the military exercises in Taiwan. On Sunday, searches for “Han Kuang maneuver” and “maneuver” on the Chinese microblogging service Weibo came up empty. The Han Kuang maneuver has been practiced since 1984. Its predecessors were the joint military maneuvers with the American military advisers of the “Military Assistance Advisory Group” (MAAG) stationed in Taiwan until 1979.
After becoming the Communist Party of China’s chief of Xinjiang Province in 2016, Chen Quanguo oversaw a security crackdown that led to a drop in births so sharp that it shocked the world. Some observers accused China’s leadership of committing genocide against the province’s mostly Muslim Uyghur population through forced sterilization and abortion. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi dismissed the allegations as “fake news,” arguing that Xinjiang’s Uyghur population had grown steadily to 12.7 million in 2018, an increase of 25% from 2010 – and higher than the 14 percent increase in the province’s total population.
But recently released 2020 census figures have delivered what amounts to a slap in the foreign ministry’s face. The data show that in 2020, Xinjiang’s Uyghur population had grown by only 16% since 2010, to 11.6 million, compared to a 19% increase in Xinjiang’s total population. Even more shocking, the Uyghur population aged 0-4 was only 36 percent the size of that aged 5-9.
The only comparable case occurred in Shandong Province in the early 1990s, when some party cadres tried to launch a campaign to be “free of newborns in 100 days.” In 2000, the number of five- to nine-year-olds in Tai’an City was only 28 percent of the number of ten- to 14-year-olds. And in 1980, when the Chinese authorities were discussing the one-child policy, there was even a creepy proposal to introduce a “newborn-free year” every few years.The only comparable antecedent to this plunge in births was in Shandong Province in the early 1990s, where some Party officials tried to launch a campaign to go “newborn-free in 100 days.” By 2000, the population of 5-9 year olds in Tai’an, a city in Shandong, was only 28 percent the size of the cohort aged 10-14. Back in 1980, when Chinese authorities were discussing the one-child policy, there was even a creepy proposal to have a “newborn-free year” every few years.
To understand why Xinjiang’s births have plummeted, it helps to review the history of population control in the province. China implemented family planning nationwide in 1973 and imposed the one-child policy in 1980. But for ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, family planning came later. Starting in 1989, minority urban couples in Xinjiang were allowed two children. Rural couples were allowed two as well, and were less likely to be forced to have abortions and sterilizations. Those “lenient” policies, combined with lagging education, led to higher fertility rates among Uyghurs. For example, the national fertility rates in 1989, 2000, and 2010 were 2.3, 1.22, and 1.18 children per woman, respectively, and 4.31, 2.0, and 1.84 for Uyghur women.
Chen’s predecessor Zhang Chunxian, who was party secretary of Hunan Province between 2005 and 2010, strongly advocated population control. Under the slogan, “to regulate family planning is to regulate productivity,” he launched a campaign to this effect in Hunan in 2006. This also affected my cousin by marriage, who was forced to have an abortion a few days before the birth of her first child because she had not applied for her birth permit in time.Chen’s predecessor, Zhang Chunxian, was keen on population control when he was CPC secretary of Hunan Province from 2005 to 2010. Arguing that “to grasp family planning is to grasp productivity,” he launched a campaign to strengthen family planning in Hunan in 2006. The campaign swept up my cousin-in-law, who was forced to abort her first child a few days before her due date because she had not applied for a birth permit in time.
In 2010, Zhang was reassigned to Xinjiang, and Hunan’s new governor, Xu Shousheng, arrived with plans to launch another campaign to strengthen population control in the province. In January 2011, I posted an “Open Letter to the Secretary and Governor of Hunan on Family Planning” online, euphemistically criticizing Zhang and Xu. In response, the Hunan authorities invited me to lecture on the topic in Hunan, and Ilham Tohti, a Uyghur economist and award-winning human-rights defender, joined me in calling for an end to family planning for the Uyghurs.
Then, on July 31, 2014, Zhang published an essay in the CPC journal Seeking Truth, arguing that Xinjiang must “implement a family-planning policy that is equal for all ethnic groups” and must “lower and stabilize fertility at a moderate level.” I was so concerned that in March 2015, I published a peer-reviewed response in the journal Population and Society, entitled “The urgency of stopping population control in view of the low fertility rates of ethnic minorities.”
In the event, Zhang did not strengthen family planning in Xinjiang. Births in the province remained stable during his tenure. But we now know that, under Chen’s rule, births plummeted from 389,695 in 2017 to 267,250 in 2018, and to 159,528 in 2021, implying three-quarters of a million fewer births in 2018-21.
Since Chinese authorities have long been notorious for mandating abortion, sterilization, and intrauterine devices, it is natural to assume that the dramatic decline in births in Xinjiang reflects such measures. But matters are not so simple, because there were slightly fewer abortions and IUDs in Xinjiang in 2017-20 than in 2013-16; and though there were 70,000 more sterilizations, that figure is still an order of magnitude smaller than the drop in births.
Given that couples in Xinjiang can legally have two or three children, it is unlikely that the authorities systematically forced abortions, ligations, and IUDs on women who had only one or two children. Why, then, was the Uyghur fertility rate in 2020 only one child per woman? Most likely, it is because Chen’s brutal crackdown both undermined Uyghur fertility habits (under the pretext of fighting Islamic extremism) and reduced the resources for parenting, through economic recession and rising unemployment. As rural Xinjiang suffered severe cultural repression and economic deprivation, the fertility rate in 2020 fell to an unusually low level compared to the province’s urban areas.
Moreover, improved education has also contributed partly to the decline in births, by leading more women to delay marriage and childbearing. Chinese authorities have invested heavily to provide 15 years of free compulsory education in Xinjiang, compared with nine years nationwide. As a result, Xinjiang’s high-school gross enrollment rate increased from 69% in 2010 to 99% in 2020, while the nationwide rate rose from 83% to just 91 percent. Uyghurs have suffered from forced sterilization, of course. But it is this forced cultural shift that appears to have had more serious consequences for the birth rate.
While the Chinese authorities have been very effective at lowering fertility rates, they have proved to be far less competent at boosting them. The recent “two-child” and “three-child” policies have both been abject failures. Looking ahead, every effort to encourage procreation in Xinjiang will fail if the region’s socioeconomic vitality continues to decline.
This failure will cause China to lose its geopolitical advantage in Central Asia, where it is in a struggle for influence with Russia. China’s rulers have heaped praise on Chen, but they have yet to recognize that his security crackdown in Xinjiang sowed the seeds of severe long-term problems. These failures will cause China to lose its geopolitical advantages in Central Asia, where it is vying with Russia for influence. Chinese rulers have praised Chen massively, but have yet to understand that his crackdown in Xinjiang has set the stage for severe long-term problems.
Yi Fuxian, a senior scientist in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is the author of Big Country with an Empty Nest (China Development Press, 2013).
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2022.
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