Shortly before the federal elections in Germany, the CDU/CSU parliamentary group submitted a minor interpellation regarding the country’s China strategy. The list from January 17 is extremely extensive with 68 questions. Table.Briefings has now been able to exclusively analyze the 37-page answers from the German government. We have chosen a few of the many topics for you.
The paper reveals: One and a half years after its publication, the implementation of the China strategy has turned out to be a disappointment and the answers often remain vague. It once again reveals the rift in the governing coalition’s approach to China. While Annalena Baerbock, whose Foreign Ministry coordinated the implementation, repeatedly voiced harsh criticism of the world’s second-largest economy, SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz always seemed worried about stepping on China’s toes.
Today’s China perspective looks at the similarities between the USA and China, specifically, the chaos that President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have unleashed in Washington D.C. Renowned journalist and founder of Caixin Media, Hu Shuli, witnessed the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution as a 13-year-old. On the social media platform WeChat, she draws a remarkable comparison: “This is an American Cultural Revolution!”
One and a half years after its publication, the German government’s evaluation of the implementation of its China strategy is disappointing. This is revealed in a government response to a minor interpellation with 68 questions from the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, which Table.Briefings has obtained exclusively. On 37 pages, much remains unclear, even though the German government visibly attempts to portray even the smallest details as progress.
According to the German government’s response, implementing the China strategy is the responsibility of the entire federal government, although the Federal Foreign Office under Green Minister Annalena Baerbock is responsible for coordination. However, the now-dissolved government coalition of the social democratic SPD, Greens and liberal FDP often appeared divided on how to deal with China. While Baerbock and other Green Party members frequently and harshly criticized the world’s second-largest economy, SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz always seemed worried about offending the People’s Republic.
The CDU/CSU parliamentary group has responded to the government coalition’s statements with scathing criticism. “The response reveals that after more than 1.5 years since the publication of its China strategy, the German government has failed to introduce tangible measures for Germany as a business location that ensures increased reciprocity in economic relations with China, effective de-risking and continued competitiveness, including in technology,” says Nicolas Zippelius (CDU), deputy member of the German Bundestag’s Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Indeed, the government remains vague on questions regarding concrete measures to achieve greater reciprocity, i.e., a level playing field for German and Chinese companies in the respective partner country. The government’s response to several differentiated questions from the opposition on market access, competitive conditions and the reduction of asymmetries is vague: It “consistently calls for reciprocity with Chinese interlocutors both at a high-level and at a technical level.” It also supports the European Commission and the European Union in their efforts to this end.
Looking at the frequency of meetings of the “Round Table of State Secretaries on China,” achieving progress in implementing the China strategy does not seem particularly pressing. According to the paper, they have only met three times – in one and a half years. What was discussed or how effective the meetings were remains unknown. The topics of these meetings are confidential. The involvement of the Federal Chancellery also appears to be limited. The head of the Federal Chancellery, Wolfgang Schmidt, has met once with the heads of the state and senate chancelleries of the federal states. That was on October 18, 2023.
However, under the leadership of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK), the ministries involved regularly exchange information on economic security issues and current priorities at various levels. The paper states that task forces responsible for economic security have been set up in the BMWK and the Federal Foreign Office, two ministries led by the Green Party. Implementing the EU economic security strategy is another inter-ministerial task requiring close coordination.
Responding to a question about the current operational implementation of de-risking, the report states: “The specific success and speed of risk mitigation measures depend on a variety of different factors, varying from industry to industry.” Based on discussions with company and association representatives as well as China-related business climate surveys, however, the government concludes that risk mitigation vis-à-vis China is highly relevant in the German economy and is “often being specifically addressed.” However, the government did not provide any further evidence of this.
In the eyes of Volker Treier, Head of Foreign Trade at the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, current efforts are insufficient. “The economic dependencies, particularly concerning raw materials and preliminary products for digitalization, energy supply and the mobility transition, cannot be replaced by other supplier countries or routes in the short term. The German government has taken the first steps with the Raw Materials Fund, but a comprehensive diversification of supply chains requires a much more proactive trade policy that relies on ratifying new trade agreements.”
In late January, election frontrunner Friedrich Merz hinted at how a potential CDU-led federal government might stand on investment guarantees when he referred to investments as a “major risk.” Addressing the companies, he said: “If you take this risk and if you have to write off these investments from one year to the next, then please do not, under any circumstances, come to the state … for help.”
This would be a sharp departure from current policy, which the German government summarizes in its response as follows: “A diversification strategy has been developed for investment guarantees in recent years. This diversification strategy provides for a moderate but targeted tightening of cover conditions for countries such as China, where there has been an excessive concentration of covered projects.”
According to Jürgen Matthes, responsible for international economic policy at IW Köln, there are two ways in which purely private corporate risks impact policy, which is still not addressed enough. “The China exposure of individual companies is primarily the risk of the companies themselves. If the costs spill over onto the taxpayer in the event of failure, it becomes a state risk,” says Matthes. “If on the other hand – as was the case with the car tariffs – you get the impression that politicians are ultimately guided by the interests of individual companies with a large exposure to China out of fear of Chinese retaliation, then the dependence of the companies also makes politicians dependent.” This was also evident, for example, in the discussion about the country’s 5G network.
However, critics complain that the German government is hesitant when it comes to critical dependency. When asked what methodology it uses to measure the successful implementation of de-risking, the German government cites the share of Chinese imports in specific product groups. It refers to these as key indicators of dependency for critical primary products and technologies.
Import dependencies on China are probably the most important aspect of risk minimization, especially – but not limited to – raw materials, says Jürgen Matthes from IW Cologne, who himself identified 60 goods for a study in which Germany has imported more than 50 percent from China over many years. According to Matthes, assessing which of these goods are indispensable and cannot currently be replaced by other suppliers is crucial. The Cologne Institute for Economic Research (IW Köln) had proposed that the German government set up a task force to review these products and determine whether the dependencies are critical. However, he feels that this has not happened. While other countries know exactly what their critical dependencies are, the German government is still largely flying blind here, he says.
According to Matthes, these are often products that only experts can assess. Therefore, it is necessary for the federal government to clarify in strict confidentiality with the importing companies whether critical dependencies exist. However, the path to identifying these companies is restricted by Section 16 of the Federal Statistics Act, which requires statistical confidentiality. “The federal government is aware of this obstacle,” but it has not mustered the political courage to solve this problem, which makes it a critical task for the next government.
To reduce one-sided dependencies on China, this must also be attractive for companies. When asked about market-based instruments for creating an incentive structure, the German government lists adjustments to foreign trade subsidies and an ambitious free trade agenda. It also talks about improving competitiveness and location conditions in Germany and the EU. However, this is precisely where the government coalition received the most criticism from the business community.
Volker Treier from the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce believes that Germany’s competitiveness as a business location is the biggest failure of the federal government. “Many German industrial companies and service providers report a deterioration in location conditions in recent years. In particular, high energy costs, tax burdens and infrastructure deficiencies as well as planning and approval procedures have slowed down competitiveness. The German government urgently needs to make improvements here to make Germany fit for the future and offer companies the support they need to diversify their supply chains.”
Few would imagine that a piece of history of the United States would resemble an episode of China’s – and yet many in China see precisely these parallels. While Donald Trump’s dramatic return to the White House was accompanied by turbulent developments, the renowned journalist Hu Shuli drew a remarkable comparison on the social media platform WeChat: “This is American style Cultural Revolution!”
Hu, founder of Caixin Media, experienced the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution in 1966 as a 13-year-old – just like Xi Jinping. Indeed, how the Trump-Musk duo wreaked havoc in the US capital is very similar to how the decade-long Cultural Revolution was operated in its beginning years.
In China in 1966, answering Mao Zedong’s call for an uprising against establishments, the so-called Red Guards – mainly high school students – attacked bureaucrats and elites, both verbally and physically. Government organizations were paralyzed; the judiciary system was abolished. The whole nation was plunged into violent chaos.
Almost 60 years later, Elon Musk sent a group of young men to take over control of data of key government departments and gutted the US Agency for International Development (USAID) as an overture of a much-publicized government downsizing. Government employees were fired or purged. Democratic elites attacked. Reports that millions of USAID money ended up in the pocket of the Clintons’ daughter started to circulate. When people filed court complaints, Vice-President JD Vance openly questioned US judges’ authority to challenge Trump.
In a well-circulated post on social media, a commentator, reportedly Zi Zhongyun 资中筠, a respected liberal scholar, said Trump and Musk appeared more to be aiming to build a dictatorship than streamlining the government. Zi is a former Institute of American Studies director of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Zi said dictators love facing the public directly and hate bureaucracies.
Historically, parallels can certainly be drawn. From Hitler to Mao, they all ruled through a small group of loyal followers. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong steered developments through the Central Cultural Revolution Group, whose de facto leadership was held by his wife, Jiang Qing.
The damage that Trump and Musk are inflicting on the US is not yet comparable to the devastation of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. But the very fact that something like this happens in the US, with, according to the latest polls, the support of more than half of its citizens, stunned people around the world, the Chinese included.
However, the chaos could be a welcome development for the Chinese leadership. For them, the chaos will help discredit Western democracy to the Chinese public, something the CCP always tries to do. More importantly, what Trump does will weaken the US and, most likely, the entire Western world, which is definitely to China’s benefit.
For the moment, however, China needs to haggle quietly with Trump’s team on a whole host of issues, which include, in alphabetical order, China’s undocumented immigration to the US, fentanyl, Taiwan, tariffs, Tiktok, trade surplus in favor of China, (possibly) Ukraine, and US control of technology exports to China.
After Trump announced the 10 percent tariff on Chinese exports and China announced its countermeasures in early February, Trump has been sending vague and conflicting messages about its communication with his Chinese counterpart. At the same time, China has been playing quiet and cool, unlike Canada and Mexico, which Trump had also threatened with tariffs. Behind the scenes, negotiations have been going on between US and Chinese diplomats.
The rivalry between China and the US is fiercer than when Trump came into office as the president in 2016, especially after China recently showed its achievement in artificial intelligence with DeepSeek. The situation is also more complicated than eight years ago. The Chinese economy is on weaker growth momentum; Trump appeared less friendly to Taiwan, complaining about the island taking “all our chip business” and giving inadequate financial contributions to the US for military protection.
In addition, Trump’s top aide, Musk, now has close business ties with China. Musk already influenced US legislation concerning China by having a provision that would regulate US investment in China removed from a bill passed in the Biden administration’s final days. The billionaire is now a wild card in US-China relations.
Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, provided a symbolic example of his role on February 9: She posted on X a picture of her having lunch with Trump’s daughter Ivanka and Wendi Deng Murdoch, the Chinese-born ex-wife of media mogul Rupert Murdoch and a go-between between China and the US.
Trump has already given an example of his mercurial approach towards China. He proposed a TikTok ban in the US in his first presidential term. But his position towards the popular App softened towards the beginning of his second term. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew was invited to attend Trump’s inauguration, together with other heavyweight business people.
What did China just celebrate? Thanks to the picture, it shouldn’t be too difficult to guess – on the 15th day of the lunar year, the Lantern Festival (元宵节) traditionally marks the end of the Chinese New Year. All over the country, people marveled at the elaborately crafted lanterns, like here in Bailuzhou Park in Nanjing. On the culinary side of the Festival, sweet dumplings made from sticky rice flour, known as tangyuan (汤圆), are served. Linguistically, they are reminiscent of the word tuanyuan (团圆) for family gatherings. However, these are over for most Chinese people: they returned to work a few days ago.
Shortly before the federal elections in Germany, the CDU/CSU parliamentary group submitted a minor interpellation regarding the country’s China strategy. The list from January 17 is extremely extensive with 68 questions. Table.Briefings has now been able to exclusively analyze the 37-page answers from the German government. We have chosen a few of the many topics for you.
The paper reveals: One and a half years after its publication, the implementation of the China strategy has turned out to be a disappointment and the answers often remain vague. It once again reveals the rift in the governing coalition’s approach to China. While Annalena Baerbock, whose Foreign Ministry coordinated the implementation, repeatedly voiced harsh criticism of the world’s second-largest economy, SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz always seemed worried about stepping on China’s toes.
Today’s China perspective looks at the similarities between the USA and China, specifically, the chaos that President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have unleashed in Washington D.C. Renowned journalist and founder of Caixin Media, Hu Shuli, witnessed the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution as a 13-year-old. On the social media platform WeChat, she draws a remarkable comparison: “This is an American Cultural Revolution!”
One and a half years after its publication, the German government’s evaluation of the implementation of its China strategy is disappointing. This is revealed in a government response to a minor interpellation with 68 questions from the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, which Table.Briefings has obtained exclusively. On 37 pages, much remains unclear, even though the German government visibly attempts to portray even the smallest details as progress.
According to the German government’s response, implementing the China strategy is the responsibility of the entire federal government, although the Federal Foreign Office under Green Minister Annalena Baerbock is responsible for coordination. However, the now-dissolved government coalition of the social democratic SPD, Greens and liberal FDP often appeared divided on how to deal with China. While Baerbock and other Green Party members frequently and harshly criticized the world’s second-largest economy, SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz always seemed worried about offending the People’s Republic.
The CDU/CSU parliamentary group has responded to the government coalition’s statements with scathing criticism. “The response reveals that after more than 1.5 years since the publication of its China strategy, the German government has failed to introduce tangible measures for Germany as a business location that ensures increased reciprocity in economic relations with China, effective de-risking and continued competitiveness, including in technology,” says Nicolas Zippelius (CDU), deputy member of the German Bundestag’s Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Indeed, the government remains vague on questions regarding concrete measures to achieve greater reciprocity, i.e., a level playing field for German and Chinese companies in the respective partner country. The government’s response to several differentiated questions from the opposition on market access, competitive conditions and the reduction of asymmetries is vague: It “consistently calls for reciprocity with Chinese interlocutors both at a high-level and at a technical level.” It also supports the European Commission and the European Union in their efforts to this end.
Looking at the frequency of meetings of the “Round Table of State Secretaries on China,” achieving progress in implementing the China strategy does not seem particularly pressing. According to the paper, they have only met three times – in one and a half years. What was discussed or how effective the meetings were remains unknown. The topics of these meetings are confidential. The involvement of the Federal Chancellery also appears to be limited. The head of the Federal Chancellery, Wolfgang Schmidt, has met once with the heads of the state and senate chancelleries of the federal states. That was on October 18, 2023.
However, under the leadership of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK), the ministries involved regularly exchange information on economic security issues and current priorities at various levels. The paper states that task forces responsible for economic security have been set up in the BMWK and the Federal Foreign Office, two ministries led by the Green Party. Implementing the EU economic security strategy is another inter-ministerial task requiring close coordination.
Responding to a question about the current operational implementation of de-risking, the report states: “The specific success and speed of risk mitigation measures depend on a variety of different factors, varying from industry to industry.” Based on discussions with company and association representatives as well as China-related business climate surveys, however, the government concludes that risk mitigation vis-à-vis China is highly relevant in the German economy and is “often being specifically addressed.” However, the government did not provide any further evidence of this.
In the eyes of Volker Treier, Head of Foreign Trade at the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, current efforts are insufficient. “The economic dependencies, particularly concerning raw materials and preliminary products for digitalization, energy supply and the mobility transition, cannot be replaced by other supplier countries or routes in the short term. The German government has taken the first steps with the Raw Materials Fund, but a comprehensive diversification of supply chains requires a much more proactive trade policy that relies on ratifying new trade agreements.”
In late January, election frontrunner Friedrich Merz hinted at how a potential CDU-led federal government might stand on investment guarantees when he referred to investments as a “major risk.” Addressing the companies, he said: “If you take this risk and if you have to write off these investments from one year to the next, then please do not, under any circumstances, come to the state … for help.”
This would be a sharp departure from current policy, which the German government summarizes in its response as follows: “A diversification strategy has been developed for investment guarantees in recent years. This diversification strategy provides for a moderate but targeted tightening of cover conditions for countries such as China, where there has been an excessive concentration of covered projects.”
According to Jürgen Matthes, responsible for international economic policy at IW Köln, there are two ways in which purely private corporate risks impact policy, which is still not addressed enough. “The China exposure of individual companies is primarily the risk of the companies themselves. If the costs spill over onto the taxpayer in the event of failure, it becomes a state risk,” says Matthes. “If on the other hand – as was the case with the car tariffs – you get the impression that politicians are ultimately guided by the interests of individual companies with a large exposure to China out of fear of Chinese retaliation, then the dependence of the companies also makes politicians dependent.” This was also evident, for example, in the discussion about the country’s 5G network.
However, critics complain that the German government is hesitant when it comes to critical dependency. When asked what methodology it uses to measure the successful implementation of de-risking, the German government cites the share of Chinese imports in specific product groups. It refers to these as key indicators of dependency for critical primary products and technologies.
Import dependencies on China are probably the most important aspect of risk minimization, especially – but not limited to – raw materials, says Jürgen Matthes from IW Cologne, who himself identified 60 goods for a study in which Germany has imported more than 50 percent from China over many years. According to Matthes, assessing which of these goods are indispensable and cannot currently be replaced by other suppliers is crucial. The Cologne Institute for Economic Research (IW Köln) had proposed that the German government set up a task force to review these products and determine whether the dependencies are critical. However, he feels that this has not happened. While other countries know exactly what their critical dependencies are, the German government is still largely flying blind here, he says.
According to Matthes, these are often products that only experts can assess. Therefore, it is necessary for the federal government to clarify in strict confidentiality with the importing companies whether critical dependencies exist. However, the path to identifying these companies is restricted by Section 16 of the Federal Statistics Act, which requires statistical confidentiality. “The federal government is aware of this obstacle,” but it has not mustered the political courage to solve this problem, which makes it a critical task for the next government.
To reduce one-sided dependencies on China, this must also be attractive for companies. When asked about market-based instruments for creating an incentive structure, the German government lists adjustments to foreign trade subsidies and an ambitious free trade agenda. It also talks about improving competitiveness and location conditions in Germany and the EU. However, this is precisely where the government coalition received the most criticism from the business community.
Volker Treier from the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce believes that Germany’s competitiveness as a business location is the biggest failure of the federal government. “Many German industrial companies and service providers report a deterioration in location conditions in recent years. In particular, high energy costs, tax burdens and infrastructure deficiencies as well as planning and approval procedures have slowed down competitiveness. The German government urgently needs to make improvements here to make Germany fit for the future and offer companies the support they need to diversify their supply chains.”
Few would imagine that a piece of history of the United States would resemble an episode of China’s – and yet many in China see precisely these parallels. While Donald Trump’s dramatic return to the White House was accompanied by turbulent developments, the renowned journalist Hu Shuli drew a remarkable comparison on the social media platform WeChat: “This is American style Cultural Revolution!”
Hu, founder of Caixin Media, experienced the beginning of the Chinese Cultural Revolution in 1966 as a 13-year-old – just like Xi Jinping. Indeed, how the Trump-Musk duo wreaked havoc in the US capital is very similar to how the decade-long Cultural Revolution was operated in its beginning years.
In China in 1966, answering Mao Zedong’s call for an uprising against establishments, the so-called Red Guards – mainly high school students – attacked bureaucrats and elites, both verbally and physically. Government organizations were paralyzed; the judiciary system was abolished. The whole nation was plunged into violent chaos.
Almost 60 years later, Elon Musk sent a group of young men to take over control of data of key government departments and gutted the US Agency for International Development (USAID) as an overture of a much-publicized government downsizing. Government employees were fired or purged. Democratic elites attacked. Reports that millions of USAID money ended up in the pocket of the Clintons’ daughter started to circulate. When people filed court complaints, Vice-President JD Vance openly questioned US judges’ authority to challenge Trump.
In a well-circulated post on social media, a commentator, reportedly Zi Zhongyun 资中筠, a respected liberal scholar, said Trump and Musk appeared more to be aiming to build a dictatorship than streamlining the government. Zi is a former Institute of American Studies director of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Zi said dictators love facing the public directly and hate bureaucracies.
Historically, parallels can certainly be drawn. From Hitler to Mao, they all ruled through a small group of loyal followers. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong steered developments through the Central Cultural Revolution Group, whose de facto leadership was held by his wife, Jiang Qing.
The damage that Trump and Musk are inflicting on the US is not yet comparable to the devastation of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. But the very fact that something like this happens in the US, with, according to the latest polls, the support of more than half of its citizens, stunned people around the world, the Chinese included.
However, the chaos could be a welcome development for the Chinese leadership. For them, the chaos will help discredit Western democracy to the Chinese public, something the CCP always tries to do. More importantly, what Trump does will weaken the US and, most likely, the entire Western world, which is definitely to China’s benefit.
For the moment, however, China needs to haggle quietly with Trump’s team on a whole host of issues, which include, in alphabetical order, China’s undocumented immigration to the US, fentanyl, Taiwan, tariffs, Tiktok, trade surplus in favor of China, (possibly) Ukraine, and US control of technology exports to China.
After Trump announced the 10 percent tariff on Chinese exports and China announced its countermeasures in early February, Trump has been sending vague and conflicting messages about its communication with his Chinese counterpart. At the same time, China has been playing quiet and cool, unlike Canada and Mexico, which Trump had also threatened with tariffs. Behind the scenes, negotiations have been going on between US and Chinese diplomats.
The rivalry between China and the US is fiercer than when Trump came into office as the president in 2016, especially after China recently showed its achievement in artificial intelligence with DeepSeek. The situation is also more complicated than eight years ago. The Chinese economy is on weaker growth momentum; Trump appeared less friendly to Taiwan, complaining about the island taking “all our chip business” and giving inadequate financial contributions to the US for military protection.
In addition, Trump’s top aide, Musk, now has close business ties with China. Musk already influenced US legislation concerning China by having a provision that would regulate US investment in China removed from a bill passed in the Biden administration’s final days. The billionaire is now a wild card in US-China relations.
Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, provided a symbolic example of his role on February 9: She posted on X a picture of her having lunch with Trump’s daughter Ivanka and Wendi Deng Murdoch, the Chinese-born ex-wife of media mogul Rupert Murdoch and a go-between between China and the US.
Trump has already given an example of his mercurial approach towards China. He proposed a TikTok ban in the US in his first presidential term. But his position towards the popular App softened towards the beginning of his second term. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew was invited to attend Trump’s inauguration, together with other heavyweight business people.
What did China just celebrate? Thanks to the picture, it shouldn’t be too difficult to guess – on the 15th day of the lunar year, the Lantern Festival (元宵节) traditionally marks the end of the Chinese New Year. All over the country, people marveled at the elaborately crafted lanterns, like here in Bailuzhou Park in Nanjing. On the culinary side of the Festival, sweet dumplings made from sticky rice flour, known as tangyuan (汤圆), are served. Linguistically, they are reminiscent of the word tuanyuan (团圆) for family gatherings. However, these are over for most Chinese people: they returned to work a few days ago.
