Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Beijing’s success in luring a number of key American allies to join the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has illustrated yet again Washington’s apparent failure to rein in the Xi Jinping administration’s ambitious plans to gradually displace the United States as the sole arbiter of global norms in […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com While Premier Li Keqiang got 45 rounds of applause as he read out the annual Government Work Report at the opening of the National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s legislature, on March 5, there is no mistaking that the “Chinese economic miracle” is coming to an end. Li’s report […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Willy Lam is away for New Years celebrations. The world’s largest military has not considered bodyweight as a factor for promotion — that is until now. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s departments of General Staff, General Logistics and General Armaments jointly issued a new directive on reforming military […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Even as President Xi Jinping’s closest advisers are preparing for his first official state visit to the United States this September, influential members of China’s foreign-policy establishment have argued that the country’s relationship with its neighbors outweighs that with the world’s only superpower. The official Chinese press is […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) propaganda machinery has gone into overdrive eulogizing the “Xi Jinping spirit.” Exhortations about “deeply implementing the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s series of important talks,” have suffused commentaries in People’s Daily, Seeking Truth and other major party mouthpieces. One commentary claimed that […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com President Xi Jinping has determined to outdo Mao Zedong in terms of building up a cult of personality: he has ordered a gigantic military parade at Tiananmen Square this autumn to demonstrate his ironclad hold over the army – and most other levers of power in the country. […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com There is evidence that after two years of no-holds-barred projection of Chinese power, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership under President and Commander-in-Chief Xi Jinping has softened its diplomatic rhetoric. Recent statements by senior officials have emphasized Beijing’s willingness to abide by international norms laid down by the […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Chinese pundits have a nickname for the Communist Party’s Central Commission on Disciplinary Inspection (CCDI): the “Eastern Factory.” The “Eastern Factory” is a notorious spy agency which emperors and eunuchs of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) used to bring down, torture and kill their enemies. While General Secretary and […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com Despite reports that the China’s GDP is about to surpass that of the United States, much of Chinese politics is still governed by Maoist norms of the 1930s and 1940s. One of Chairman’s Mao Zedong’s most famous dictums — “power grows out of the barrel of a gun” […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com The impending default — and possible collapse — of the Russian economy has not only caught the Xi Jinping administration by surprise but also cast doubt on Beijing’s two-year-old “Russia first” foreign policy. Despite the fact that one of the first diplomatic acts of President Xi was to […]