The grey Mao suit already set the tone and the rhetoric with its usual slogans about Marxism with Chinese characteristics and the glorious party completed the look. Of course, a ruler like Xi Jinping doesn’t dare take a bold step into the future. But it is still shocking, even after eight years, to watch him further march into the past. Frank Sieren listened to Xi and analyzed his speech on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party. Few innovations were to be found, but instead, we heard a pithy formulation about a “wall of steel” with which China wants to protect itself from the world.
Johnny Erling tells of a different time in his dealings with China when the People’s Republic was in fact much more closed off, but at the same time highly curious about the outside world. Franz Josef Strauss was spontaneously picked up from the Great Wall for a surprise audience with Mao in Changsha, about 1,450 kilometers away. German politicians like the rivals Strauss, Kohl and Schmidt still competed with each other in who was allowed to talk to Mao the longest. Each was convinced China was important, although at the time it was all still a far cry from what would later become good economic relations.
Today, the Volkswagen Group displays high levels of disappointment when it was selling a mere 1,500 units of their new model in a month in its favorite market. The ID.4 electric SUV simply just doesn’t have enough modern technology, as Felix Lee reports. While German car buyers may still dismiss the digital features as neat at best and instead pay more attention to gap widths, smoothness and other quality features, these digital gimmicks are top on the lists of China’s young drivers. VW now wants to further improve on upcoming model launches and incorporate more AI right from the start.
The world did not stop in China as State and Party leader Xi Jinping delivered the Chinese Communist Party’s centenary speech at Tiananmen Square in Beijing yesterday morning. Construction workers did not stop their work on the two new bridges over the Liangma River between the Kempinski Hotel and Solana Shopping Mall, although the speech can be easily received via a live stream on a smartphone. In Sanlitun Taikoo Li, one of Beijing’s most popular and classiest shopping and nightlife districts, the speech is even broadcast on a giant screen, but the public viewing spot is deserted except for a handful of spectators. The Chinese know that their president will have not much new to say. And they are proud of China’s successes regardless.
Xi kept the event relatively simple. There was no big parade, as has been the case time and again in the past 20 years. Only a formation of military helicopters formed the number 100 in the sky and flew with hanging flags that read, among other things, “Long live the Communist Party”. Formations of the modern Chinese supersonic J-20 fighter jet, trailing blue, yellow, and red stripes of color, flew briefly overhead. More a festive gesture than a military show of force.
A salute of 100 rounds was fired from 56 cannons representing the number of ethnic groups in China, while an honor guard of the three branches of the armed forces marched from the Monument to the People’s Heroes in the center of the square, some of them in goose step and the square was lined with 100 flags. Otherwise, no large setups in Tiananmen Square, just three big red arches in the center. One of them reads 1921 and the second, the largest, shows the hammer and sickle. The third one reads 2021. The square is filled mainly with 70,000 party members from different walks of life. Most of them are sitting on folding chairs. The presentation of the masses in Tiananmen Square is surprisingly traditional and does not reflect a modern diverse China.
Xi himself presents himself in an emphatically modest manner, which makes him seem all the more powerful. He is the only member of the leadership to wear a gray suit with a very large closed collar, like the one Mao Zedong wore when China was founded. Underneath, one just hardly sees the edge of the white stand-up collar shirt. Behind him only the mighty gold decorated doors on the balcony of the Tian’anmen Gate above the large portrait of Mao. In front of him are the traditional five microphones, a number of which makes no sense technical-wise, but makes his claim to power visually clear. The only decoration in this carefully composed image of the president is the simple emblem with a hammer and sickle on the front of the lectern.
Xi’s speech begins with China’s success in transforming itself from an impoverished country into the world’s second-largest economy. China welcomes “constructive criticism from abroad”. His country is eager to learn from the achievements of other cultures. The Chinese nation “carries no aggressive or hegemonic traits in its genes”. China has always worked “to safeguard world peace, participate in global development and uphold international order.”
For the future, China pledged to “build a new form of the international order for a common future”. In doing so, it would cooperate with all peace-loving countries and promote “common values of peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy, and freedom”. China will continue to “favor cooperation over confrontation, and pledges to further open rather than close its doors, and focus development in mutual benefit”.
But then his tone turns frosty. China will no longer be dictated, Xi said. “We will never accept hypocritical preaching from those who think they have the right to lecture us.” China must now go its own way. The time for bullying China is “gone forever”, Xi said.
He then heightens the motif of separation from the outside world. “Anyone who dares try to do that will have their heads bashed bloody against a Great Wall of steel forged by over 1.4 billion Chinese people.” At this point, the 70,000 people in the square erupted in cheers. He certainly struck a chord with the popular mood. It is one of the few places where Xi falls into the new nationalist pitch. The hour-long speech otherwise offered few other surprises.
The party leader then also called for the modernization of the armed forces, saying, “A strong nation must have a strong army.” However, he did not mention the army until the last third of the speech. In doing so, he stressed that the army must strictly adhere to politics.
Xi criticized the “independence forces” in Taiwan. The vast majority of the world’s governments view it as part of China, the party leader claimed. He called for “peaceful reunification” with the island. No one should underestimate China’s determination and ability to “defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity”. Everyone must work together to “crush any efforts to make Taiwan independent.”
Xi Jinping underlined the leadership role of the Party. China’s success depends on the Party. Without the Party, there would be no “renewal”. However, the many dark sides of the Party’s history do not play a role during the 100-year celebrations.
It was originally supposed to help Volkswagen achieve a breakthrough in electric mobility in China: The ID.4, the first SUV of the all-electric ID family. Yet, at least the debut failed in the world’s largest and most important sales market for VW.
In May, Volkswagen merely sold 1,213 units of the model in China, about 200 fewer than in April, the first month after the model launched. At least according to data recently released by auto consultancy LMC.
But Volkswagen disagrees with this figure. A spokesperson told Reuters news agency that 1,500 vehicles of the two models ID.4 X and ID.Crozz were sold in May alone, about 200 more than in April. They attributed the difference to LMC’s figures with a different data collection method.
But 200 more or less, the figures are a bitter disappointment within the group, as several people familiar with the matter revealed. “Sales have so far fallen short of our expectations. We’ve had to keep scaling down production plans for the ID.4,” an insider is quoted. “It’s not healthy, but right now customers aren’t coming to buy them.”
VW has been selling the ID.4 in China in two different versions since the beginning of April. They are manufactured by two different cooperation partners. The ID.4X is produced together with SAIC from Shanghai. The ID.4 Crozz is produced with VW joint venture partner FAW in the northeastern Chinese city of Changchun. However, both variants differ only minimally in terms of design.
Insiders tell Reuters that the poor debut of both SUV models is due to a lack of technical features. In addition, there is stiff competition, a comparatively late start, and problems with a new distribution network for EVs in China. Chinese manufacturers, in particular, shine with plenty of technology that brings their vehicles close to autonomous driving. Volkswagen, in particular, is doing much worse here than US rival Tesla. This reflects in its sales figures. At the debut of its Model Y SUV, Tesla delivered a total of 6,612 vehicles in the first two months after its launch in China, nearly three times as many as VW did with its ID.4 models. The Model Y is comparable to the ID.4.
However, VW headquarter officially disagrees. “In the currently ongoing launch phase, which includes not only the ramp-up of the factories but also a completely new sales model, sales for the two models are in line with expectations.” “We are seeing steady growth in deliveries and are confident that demand will continue to develop positively in the coming months,” a VW spokesperson said. Globally, the ID.4 is meeting with strong customer interest. VW has already received more than 50,000 orders. In fact, sales in Europe are looking much better. There, according to data from JATO Dynamics, the ID.4 was actually the best-selling EV to date, with around 12,100 vehicles sold in the first two months after market launch.
Volkswagen strives to become the world’s largest supplier of electric cars by 2025. The Wolfsburg-based group has already invested many billions of euros in the development of new vehicles, and further investments are to follow. By 2030 at the latest, the entire group wants to become a pure manufacturer of EVs. However, the decisive battle is taking place in China, the world’s largest automobile market, where Volkswagen recently made more than 40 percent of its sales and remains the market leader in cars with combustion engines. In combustion technology, Chinese competitors have not been able to keep up with the competition from Germany all these years, despite massive state subsidies.
Yet the situation is completely different for electromobility. Here, too, the Chinese leadership is providing massive support for domestic manufacturers. But this also means that the competition here is particularly fierce. Chinese companies such as BYD are even the global leaders in battery technology, which is an important factor.
China’s manufacturers are also particularly bold when it comes to introducing technical innovations around autonomous driving. They offer many functions that VW is still hesitant to release for the mass market. Unlike the VW ID.4, the cars from Xpeng and Nio have the ability to park automatically and also offer voice control. Volkswagen plans to offer such functions only through software updates.
VW is now looking for a way forward. With the ID.6 CROZZ and ID.6 X, the next ID models are already about to be launched in China. These models are supposed to offer the technical refinements that the ID.4 still lacks. VW is far too slow to realize that young Chinese customers, in particular, want a digital device on wheels instead of a classic car, to which the manufacturer graciously adds a few computer functions. And this despite the fact that the company has been active in China for so long and actually knows the consumer interests very well.
Taking a swing at China is part of the standard repertoire in the US political campaign. It is now gradually spilling over to Europe. In Germany, political parties are also taking a stand ahead of the Bundestag elections, where the People’s Republic is still a partner or already a “competitor and systemic rival”. The Berlin-based China Research Institute Merics compared the election programs and drew a conclusion: “Unlike previous election campaigns, China is playing a bigger role this time. Almost all parties are taking a critical stance on China.”
Since the latest G7 and NATO meetings, Beijing’s hopes of playing off a Europe that, thanks to Merkel and Macron, continues to have a positive stance toward China against the confrontational US have dwindled. The Global Times expressed irritation about the new belief within the CDU that China is “today’s greatest challenge for foreign and security policy”. This stood in strong contrast to more conciliatory signals from the candidate for chancellor, Armin Laschet. Last week, in an interview with the Financial Times, he warned of starting a “cold war with China”. Confused, the Global Times wondered which represents the official stance now.
In the past, it was quite different when German politicians competed to see who was more popular in Beijing and with dictator Mao Zedong and hoped it would help them score points in the German election campaign. The diplomat Wang Shu experienced this firsthand as an eyewitness. In 1969 he visited Bonn, the then German capital, as a correspondent for Xinhua, and helped to establish diplomatic relations in 1972. In 1974, he took a lateral career move to the position of Chinese ambassador after Mao approvingly scribbled “He’s good for it” on one of his analyses of German politics. Wang passed away in Beijing in September 2020. He lived to the age of 95.
I was allowed to visit the diplomatic doyen at home more than a dozen times after he retired. He often told anecdotes about how German politicians courted China’s favor, laughing boisterously. CSU opposition leader Franz Josef Strauß was the first to succeed in talking to Mao for an hour in January 1975. Chancellor Helmut Schmidt then demanded face-saving equal treatment from Beijing when he visited the government in October 1975. But the 82-year-old Mao was too weak due to his advanced age to schedule a meeting with him in advance. On October 30, 1975, and in the midst of a parley with then-Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping, the redemptive news came for Schmidt. Mao would see him now. Deng and Schmidt then “literally dropped everything” to rush to Mao. Although Mao was barely able to speak, he was mentally capable of conducting the conversation with Schmidt with the help of his assistants.
Even more absurd was what Wang overheard when he sat in Schmidt’s car on the return trip after the meeting, which lasted almost one and three-quarter hours. The chancellor was not recapitulating his recent exchange with Mao about the world situation, their different views on the Soviet Union, or philosophers and strategists like Kant and Clausewitz. Only one thing had mattered to Schmidt: He cheered when the then Federal Minister of Transport, Kurt Gscheidle, who was also riding along, congratulated him – Schmidt’s conversation with Mao had lasted 100 minutes, 20 minutes longer than Mao’s meeting with Strauß.
The next day, while hiking the Great Wall, Schmidt asked Wang what distance Strauss had reached on the wall. Demonstratively, he continued climbing: “For me, there is no other choice. I have to get higher.” He then gazed over the landscape with his binoculars and celebrated that he could see no (Helmut) Kohl (meaning “cabbage” in German), “only Chinese cabbage”. In his autobiography, “Mao’s Man in Bonn,” Wang Shu wrote that journalists traveling with him created the headline: “The Bundestag election campaign has begun at the Great Wall.”
In Beijing’s embassy in Bonn, the requests of German politicians for trips to China increased. It is said Strauss was the most persistent. Wang suggested a trip in autumn 1974, but Strauss did not want to travel at the same time as CDU opposition leader Helmut Kohl, who had announced his visit for September 1974. So his trip was postponed until January 1975, which now alienated Schmidt. Schmidt wanted to make his inaugural visit to Beijing as chancellor in March or April 1975. “At that time, I had my hands full managing the appointments for Strauss and Schmidt so that it would not displease anyone.”
China’s invitation to Soviet Union-Basher Strauss to travel ahead Chancellor Schmidt triggered domestic political controversy in Germany, as it was seen as an affront to the SPD’s eastern politics and détente policy. Strauss later explained what connected him with Peking: Mao had been concerned with containing the Soviet Union. Therefore, Mao supported European unification. Europe’s policy, Strauss argued, should not be oriented only toward the United States but “must also see a partner in the People’s Republic of China who contributes to maintaining the balance”.
Therefore, Strauss was ready to go any distance to meet Mao. This happened in a way that is unthinkable today. During his visit to the Great Wall, Strauss, his wife Marianne and two colleagues suddenly disappeared on January 16, 1975. In a time without Internet and mobile phones, neither the journalists nor the German embassy was aware at first. Even Wang remained on the sidelines. Only late at night did the missing CSU leader reappear in his Beijing hotel. He only said: “I was at the Ussuri”.
It was like a coup. Top party officials had unobtrusively intercepted the group of four with Strauss and accompanied them to the airfield, where Deng was already waiting as a fellow passenger. Strauss asked no questions when he heard that Mao wanted to see him.
Only a few years ago, a Chinese chronicle revealed that their destination was the southwestern provincial capital of Changsha, 1,450 kilometers away, where Mao spent the winter in a state guesthouse. Like Strauss, he had other politicians flown in conspiratorially, such as Edward Heath and Henry Kissinger. They all went along with it, promised to keep quiet. By the way: None of the guests even dreamed of asking the dictator about China’s handling of human rights.
In Strauss’s memoirs “Erinnerungen”, published after his death, he wrote that Mao warned Western Europeans against their “Finlandization” by the Soviet Union. He and Strauss immediately got along great, China’s Chronicle confirmed. Mao was pleased Strauss told him he would also envision a China that was economically and industrially strong in the future as well as keeping the peace. A China that Europe would not have to fear. “Very good,” Mao replied. “You need not fear us.”
People in Europe see things differently today. Those encounters of that time seem like a message from another world and time. The Cold War of the superpowers and Beijing’s fear of the Soviet Union drove China and the West closer to each other. Kohl, Schröder, and Merkel followed in the footsteps of Strauss and Schmidt – for both economic interests and calculated reasons.
But today, Beijing is taking Moscow’s place. Trying to show off a pro-China stance in the German election campaign is no longer an option.
While Beijing celebrated the CCP’s birthday, demonstrators gathered in New Delhi in front of the Chinese embassy to protest against the tyranny in Tibet. The Tibetan Youth Congress protested that the human rights situation continues to deteriorate. When young people started tearing up Chinese flags, police intervened and detained them on a bus.
The grey Mao suit already set the tone and the rhetoric with its usual slogans about Marxism with Chinese characteristics and the glorious party completed the look. Of course, a ruler like Xi Jinping doesn’t dare take a bold step into the future. But it is still shocking, even after eight years, to watch him further march into the past. Frank Sieren listened to Xi and analyzed his speech on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party. Few innovations were to be found, but instead, we heard a pithy formulation about a “wall of steel” with which China wants to protect itself from the world.
Johnny Erling tells of a different time in his dealings with China when the People’s Republic was in fact much more closed off, but at the same time highly curious about the outside world. Franz Josef Strauss was spontaneously picked up from the Great Wall for a surprise audience with Mao in Changsha, about 1,450 kilometers away. German politicians like the rivals Strauss, Kohl and Schmidt still competed with each other in who was allowed to talk to Mao the longest. Each was convinced China was important, although at the time it was all still a far cry from what would later become good economic relations.
Today, the Volkswagen Group displays high levels of disappointment when it was selling a mere 1,500 units of their new model in a month in its favorite market. The ID.4 electric SUV simply just doesn’t have enough modern technology, as Felix Lee reports. While German car buyers may still dismiss the digital features as neat at best and instead pay more attention to gap widths, smoothness and other quality features, these digital gimmicks are top on the lists of China’s young drivers. VW now wants to further improve on upcoming model launches and incorporate more AI right from the start.
The world did not stop in China as State and Party leader Xi Jinping delivered the Chinese Communist Party’s centenary speech at Tiananmen Square in Beijing yesterday morning. Construction workers did not stop their work on the two new bridges over the Liangma River between the Kempinski Hotel and Solana Shopping Mall, although the speech can be easily received via a live stream on a smartphone. In Sanlitun Taikoo Li, one of Beijing’s most popular and classiest shopping and nightlife districts, the speech is even broadcast on a giant screen, but the public viewing spot is deserted except for a handful of spectators. The Chinese know that their president will have not much new to say. And they are proud of China’s successes regardless.
Xi kept the event relatively simple. There was no big parade, as has been the case time and again in the past 20 years. Only a formation of military helicopters formed the number 100 in the sky and flew with hanging flags that read, among other things, “Long live the Communist Party”. Formations of the modern Chinese supersonic J-20 fighter jet, trailing blue, yellow, and red stripes of color, flew briefly overhead. More a festive gesture than a military show of force.
A salute of 100 rounds was fired from 56 cannons representing the number of ethnic groups in China, while an honor guard of the three branches of the armed forces marched from the Monument to the People’s Heroes in the center of the square, some of them in goose step and the square was lined with 100 flags. Otherwise, no large setups in Tiananmen Square, just three big red arches in the center. One of them reads 1921 and the second, the largest, shows the hammer and sickle. The third one reads 2021. The square is filled mainly with 70,000 party members from different walks of life. Most of them are sitting on folding chairs. The presentation of the masses in Tiananmen Square is surprisingly traditional and does not reflect a modern diverse China.
Xi himself presents himself in an emphatically modest manner, which makes him seem all the more powerful. He is the only member of the leadership to wear a gray suit with a very large closed collar, like the one Mao Zedong wore when China was founded. Underneath, one just hardly sees the edge of the white stand-up collar shirt. Behind him only the mighty gold decorated doors on the balcony of the Tian’anmen Gate above the large portrait of Mao. In front of him are the traditional five microphones, a number of which makes no sense technical-wise, but makes his claim to power visually clear. The only decoration in this carefully composed image of the president is the simple emblem with a hammer and sickle on the front of the lectern.
Xi’s speech begins with China’s success in transforming itself from an impoverished country into the world’s second-largest economy. China welcomes “constructive criticism from abroad”. His country is eager to learn from the achievements of other cultures. The Chinese nation “carries no aggressive or hegemonic traits in its genes”. China has always worked “to safeguard world peace, participate in global development and uphold international order.”
For the future, China pledged to “build a new form of the international order for a common future”. In doing so, it would cooperate with all peace-loving countries and promote “common values of peace, development, fairness, justice, democracy, and freedom”. China will continue to “favor cooperation over confrontation, and pledges to further open rather than close its doors, and focus development in mutual benefit”.
But then his tone turns frosty. China will no longer be dictated, Xi said. “We will never accept hypocritical preaching from those who think they have the right to lecture us.” China must now go its own way. The time for bullying China is “gone forever”, Xi said.
He then heightens the motif of separation from the outside world. “Anyone who dares try to do that will have their heads bashed bloody against a Great Wall of steel forged by over 1.4 billion Chinese people.” At this point, the 70,000 people in the square erupted in cheers. He certainly struck a chord with the popular mood. It is one of the few places where Xi falls into the new nationalist pitch. The hour-long speech otherwise offered few other surprises.
The party leader then also called for the modernization of the armed forces, saying, “A strong nation must have a strong army.” However, he did not mention the army until the last third of the speech. In doing so, he stressed that the army must strictly adhere to politics.
Xi criticized the “independence forces” in Taiwan. The vast majority of the world’s governments view it as part of China, the party leader claimed. He called for “peaceful reunification” with the island. No one should underestimate China’s determination and ability to “defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity”. Everyone must work together to “crush any efforts to make Taiwan independent.”
Xi Jinping underlined the leadership role of the Party. China’s success depends on the Party. Without the Party, there would be no “renewal”. However, the many dark sides of the Party’s history do not play a role during the 100-year celebrations.
It was originally supposed to help Volkswagen achieve a breakthrough in electric mobility in China: The ID.4, the first SUV of the all-electric ID family. Yet, at least the debut failed in the world’s largest and most important sales market for VW.
In May, Volkswagen merely sold 1,213 units of the model in China, about 200 fewer than in April, the first month after the model launched. At least according to data recently released by auto consultancy LMC.
But Volkswagen disagrees with this figure. A spokesperson told Reuters news agency that 1,500 vehicles of the two models ID.4 X and ID.Crozz were sold in May alone, about 200 more than in April. They attributed the difference to LMC’s figures with a different data collection method.
But 200 more or less, the figures are a bitter disappointment within the group, as several people familiar with the matter revealed. “Sales have so far fallen short of our expectations. We’ve had to keep scaling down production plans for the ID.4,” an insider is quoted. “It’s not healthy, but right now customers aren’t coming to buy them.”
VW has been selling the ID.4 in China in two different versions since the beginning of April. They are manufactured by two different cooperation partners. The ID.4X is produced together with SAIC from Shanghai. The ID.4 Crozz is produced with VW joint venture partner FAW in the northeastern Chinese city of Changchun. However, both variants differ only minimally in terms of design.
Insiders tell Reuters that the poor debut of both SUV models is due to a lack of technical features. In addition, there is stiff competition, a comparatively late start, and problems with a new distribution network for EVs in China. Chinese manufacturers, in particular, shine with plenty of technology that brings their vehicles close to autonomous driving. Volkswagen, in particular, is doing much worse here than US rival Tesla. This reflects in its sales figures. At the debut of its Model Y SUV, Tesla delivered a total of 6,612 vehicles in the first two months after its launch in China, nearly three times as many as VW did with its ID.4 models. The Model Y is comparable to the ID.4.
However, VW headquarter officially disagrees. “In the currently ongoing launch phase, which includes not only the ramp-up of the factories but also a completely new sales model, sales for the two models are in line with expectations.” “We are seeing steady growth in deliveries and are confident that demand will continue to develop positively in the coming months,” a VW spokesperson said. Globally, the ID.4 is meeting with strong customer interest. VW has already received more than 50,000 orders. In fact, sales in Europe are looking much better. There, according to data from JATO Dynamics, the ID.4 was actually the best-selling EV to date, with around 12,100 vehicles sold in the first two months after market launch.
Volkswagen strives to become the world’s largest supplier of electric cars by 2025. The Wolfsburg-based group has already invested many billions of euros in the development of new vehicles, and further investments are to follow. By 2030 at the latest, the entire group wants to become a pure manufacturer of EVs. However, the decisive battle is taking place in China, the world’s largest automobile market, where Volkswagen recently made more than 40 percent of its sales and remains the market leader in cars with combustion engines. In combustion technology, Chinese competitors have not been able to keep up with the competition from Germany all these years, despite massive state subsidies.
Yet the situation is completely different for electromobility. Here, too, the Chinese leadership is providing massive support for domestic manufacturers. But this also means that the competition here is particularly fierce. Chinese companies such as BYD are even the global leaders in battery technology, which is an important factor.
China’s manufacturers are also particularly bold when it comes to introducing technical innovations around autonomous driving. They offer many functions that VW is still hesitant to release for the mass market. Unlike the VW ID.4, the cars from Xpeng and Nio have the ability to park automatically and also offer voice control. Volkswagen plans to offer such functions only through software updates.
VW is now looking for a way forward. With the ID.6 CROZZ and ID.6 X, the next ID models are already about to be launched in China. These models are supposed to offer the technical refinements that the ID.4 still lacks. VW is far too slow to realize that young Chinese customers, in particular, want a digital device on wheels instead of a classic car, to which the manufacturer graciously adds a few computer functions. And this despite the fact that the company has been active in China for so long and actually knows the consumer interests very well.
Taking a swing at China is part of the standard repertoire in the US political campaign. It is now gradually spilling over to Europe. In Germany, political parties are also taking a stand ahead of the Bundestag elections, where the People’s Republic is still a partner or already a “competitor and systemic rival”. The Berlin-based China Research Institute Merics compared the election programs and drew a conclusion: “Unlike previous election campaigns, China is playing a bigger role this time. Almost all parties are taking a critical stance on China.”
Since the latest G7 and NATO meetings, Beijing’s hopes of playing off a Europe that, thanks to Merkel and Macron, continues to have a positive stance toward China against the confrontational US have dwindled. The Global Times expressed irritation about the new belief within the CDU that China is “today’s greatest challenge for foreign and security policy”. This stood in strong contrast to more conciliatory signals from the candidate for chancellor, Armin Laschet. Last week, in an interview with the Financial Times, he warned of starting a “cold war with China”. Confused, the Global Times wondered which represents the official stance now.
In the past, it was quite different when German politicians competed to see who was more popular in Beijing and with dictator Mao Zedong and hoped it would help them score points in the German election campaign. The diplomat Wang Shu experienced this firsthand as an eyewitness. In 1969 he visited Bonn, the then German capital, as a correspondent for Xinhua, and helped to establish diplomatic relations in 1972. In 1974, he took a lateral career move to the position of Chinese ambassador after Mao approvingly scribbled “He’s good for it” on one of his analyses of German politics. Wang passed away in Beijing in September 2020. He lived to the age of 95.
I was allowed to visit the diplomatic doyen at home more than a dozen times after he retired. He often told anecdotes about how German politicians courted China’s favor, laughing boisterously. CSU opposition leader Franz Josef Strauß was the first to succeed in talking to Mao for an hour in January 1975. Chancellor Helmut Schmidt then demanded face-saving equal treatment from Beijing when he visited the government in October 1975. But the 82-year-old Mao was too weak due to his advanced age to schedule a meeting with him in advance. On October 30, 1975, and in the midst of a parley with then-Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping, the redemptive news came for Schmidt. Mao would see him now. Deng and Schmidt then “literally dropped everything” to rush to Mao. Although Mao was barely able to speak, he was mentally capable of conducting the conversation with Schmidt with the help of his assistants.
Even more absurd was what Wang overheard when he sat in Schmidt’s car on the return trip after the meeting, which lasted almost one and three-quarter hours. The chancellor was not recapitulating his recent exchange with Mao about the world situation, their different views on the Soviet Union, or philosophers and strategists like Kant and Clausewitz. Only one thing had mattered to Schmidt: He cheered when the then Federal Minister of Transport, Kurt Gscheidle, who was also riding along, congratulated him – Schmidt’s conversation with Mao had lasted 100 minutes, 20 minutes longer than Mao’s meeting with Strauß.
The next day, while hiking the Great Wall, Schmidt asked Wang what distance Strauss had reached on the wall. Demonstratively, he continued climbing: “For me, there is no other choice. I have to get higher.” He then gazed over the landscape with his binoculars and celebrated that he could see no (Helmut) Kohl (meaning “cabbage” in German), “only Chinese cabbage”. In his autobiography, “Mao’s Man in Bonn,” Wang Shu wrote that journalists traveling with him created the headline: “The Bundestag election campaign has begun at the Great Wall.”
In Beijing’s embassy in Bonn, the requests of German politicians for trips to China increased. It is said Strauss was the most persistent. Wang suggested a trip in autumn 1974, but Strauss did not want to travel at the same time as CDU opposition leader Helmut Kohl, who had announced his visit for September 1974. So his trip was postponed until January 1975, which now alienated Schmidt. Schmidt wanted to make his inaugural visit to Beijing as chancellor in March or April 1975. “At that time, I had my hands full managing the appointments for Strauss and Schmidt so that it would not displease anyone.”
China’s invitation to Soviet Union-Basher Strauss to travel ahead Chancellor Schmidt triggered domestic political controversy in Germany, as it was seen as an affront to the SPD’s eastern politics and détente policy. Strauss later explained what connected him with Peking: Mao had been concerned with containing the Soviet Union. Therefore, Mao supported European unification. Europe’s policy, Strauss argued, should not be oriented only toward the United States but “must also see a partner in the People’s Republic of China who contributes to maintaining the balance”.
Therefore, Strauss was ready to go any distance to meet Mao. This happened in a way that is unthinkable today. During his visit to the Great Wall, Strauss, his wife Marianne and two colleagues suddenly disappeared on January 16, 1975. In a time without Internet and mobile phones, neither the journalists nor the German embassy was aware at first. Even Wang remained on the sidelines. Only late at night did the missing CSU leader reappear in his Beijing hotel. He only said: “I was at the Ussuri”.
It was like a coup. Top party officials had unobtrusively intercepted the group of four with Strauss and accompanied them to the airfield, where Deng was already waiting as a fellow passenger. Strauss asked no questions when he heard that Mao wanted to see him.
Only a few years ago, a Chinese chronicle revealed that their destination was the southwestern provincial capital of Changsha, 1,450 kilometers away, where Mao spent the winter in a state guesthouse. Like Strauss, he had other politicians flown in conspiratorially, such as Edward Heath and Henry Kissinger. They all went along with it, promised to keep quiet. By the way: None of the guests even dreamed of asking the dictator about China’s handling of human rights.
In Strauss’s memoirs “Erinnerungen”, published after his death, he wrote that Mao warned Western Europeans against their “Finlandization” by the Soviet Union. He and Strauss immediately got along great, China’s Chronicle confirmed. Mao was pleased Strauss told him he would also envision a China that was economically and industrially strong in the future as well as keeping the peace. A China that Europe would not have to fear. “Very good,” Mao replied. “You need not fear us.”
People in Europe see things differently today. Those encounters of that time seem like a message from another world and time. The Cold War of the superpowers and Beijing’s fear of the Soviet Union drove China and the West closer to each other. Kohl, Schröder, and Merkel followed in the footsteps of Strauss and Schmidt – for both economic interests and calculated reasons.
But today, Beijing is taking Moscow’s place. Trying to show off a pro-China stance in the German election campaign is no longer an option.
While Beijing celebrated the CCP’s birthday, demonstrators gathered in New Delhi in front of the Chinese embassy to protest against the tyranny in Tibet. The Tibetan Youth Congress protested that the human rights situation continues to deteriorate. When young people started tearing up Chinese flags, police intervened and detained them on a bus.
