Shane Leary joins Miles Yu to discuss the implications of Kim Jong Un’s recent meeting with Vladimir Putin and the budding strategic partnership between North Korea and Russia. They then turn to the missing Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu, before turning to Miles’ reflections on Jake Sullivan’s meeting with Wang Yi in Malta and what this means for the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in San Francisco, where Joe Biden and Xi Jinping are expected to meet for the first time since last November. Follow the China Center's work at https://www.hudson.org/china-center
Shane Leary joins Miles Yu to discuss the implications of Kim Jong Un’s recent meeting with Vladimir Putin and the budding strategic partnership between North Korea and Russia. They then turn to the missing Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu, before turning to Miles’ reflections on Jake Sullivan’s meeting with Wang Yi in Malta and what this means for the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in San Francisco, where Joe Biden and Xi Jinping are expected to meet for the first time since last November.
Follow the China Center's work at https://www.hudson.org/china-center and subscribe to our newsletter China Digest.
Miles Yu:
Welcome to China Insider, a podcast from Hudson Institute's China Center.
Shane Leary:
It's Tuesday, September 19th, and we have three topics this week. The first is the budding strategic partnership between North Korea and Russia, and Miles reflections on the recent meeting between Kim Jong-Un and Putin. Second is the newest disappearance of a high level Chinese official with China's defense minister Li Shangfu, having not been seen in over two weeks and third miles offers his thoughts on the weekend meeting between Jake Sullivan and Wang Yi and his predictions on the upcoming Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in San Francisco. Biden and Xi Jinping are expected to meet for the first time since November of last year. Miles. How are you?
Miles Yu:
Very good, Shane.
Shane Leary:
For our first question. This past week, Kim Jong-un met with Vladimir Putin at the easternmost Spaceport in Russia. No official communicates or joint statements came out of this meeting, although analysts are speculating that Putin is in need of weapons and Kim Jong-un is in need of satellite technology and assistance with this space program. Miles, what do you make of this development?
Miles Yu:
Well, Russia and North Korea are now the two international renowned pariah states desperately in need of each other. Neither can really go, Putin and Kim, neither can go anywhere without taking great personal security risk. Kim is the king of paranoia. Putin is wanted international war criminal, so they couldn't travel any far. So maybe for Kim, the safe country to travel for him is Russia and Kim also has invited Russia, Putin to visit North Korea. That's probably the only country Putin can really go safely without really a big problem. Putin couldn't even go to BRICS Summit in South Africa a few weeks ago. Now you mentioned about this substantial arm steel and the technological corporation, that's for real. It goes both ways. Was Kim Jong could give to Putin are sort of a low-end weapons, particularly shells and artillery pieces. But also another thing I think maybe in light of the collapse of Wagner Group, which was pretty much like a commando special operations force that really is not working anymore.
So North Korea has the world's largest commando or special operation force in numbers staggering 140,000 strong. So maybe Kim could put in some kind of a capability in the commando area, at least a training for operation in Ukraine. This is remain to be seen, but this is a very likely scenario. But what Putin can give Kim is much, much more. It will be in the three key areas. Number one, North Korea is a country that's constantly on the verge of starvation and famine. So Russia is one of the world's largest green export countries. So Russia can provide stable food supply to North Korea. Secondly, Russia is also a country of great energy. So North Korea is a highly militarized regime. It has over 1 million strong military running all kinds of machines, war machines. So North Korea has enormous needs for energy, gas and oil. That's what Russia could provide. Number three, I think the most importantly is Russia's capability to help North Korea modernize its obsolete weapons of 1950s vintage.
Modern warfare platforms, particularly satellites, is important. North Korea keeps failing to launch satellites lately. So this is why the summit was held in the satellite launch spot and also Russia could substantially upgrade. North Korea's big submarine fleet. North Korea has over 60 submarines. They're all really old obsolete antiques. So Russia could provide really advanced even next generation submarine technologies to North Korea and in addition to missile technologies also. So that is where in the realm of arms negotiation and mutual support. Now there is a big subtest here that is North Korea traditionally depends heavily on China, you can say even is over reliance on China, particularly in the areas of food supply and energy supply. So North Korea now realize China can be extremely optimistic. It has no principle. So when you really are in need, China may not come to your help. So North Korea also has a supply chain problems, wants to diversify his strategic supply chain. So going to Russia is definitely a plan B, having said all this kind of rapprochement, one has a very profound unintended consequence. It shows to the world threat of this kind. Aggression from Moscow and Pyongyang were actually a global problem. Therefore it has provided a very strong, another strong impetus and reason for NATO alliance, for example, to expand its footprint to Asia-Pacific as Japan and South Korea and many other countries in the region have been advocating
Shane Leary:
For our next topic, China's defense minister Li Shangfu has been missing for over two weeks now and China's foreign ministry has been rather cagey as to why it looks like we're seeing another instance in the series of high level disappearances. We witnessed this summer beginning with China's foreign minister or former foreign minister Qin Gang who has been missing since June 25th. It appears Li is under investigation for corruption, particularly a broad probe regarding the procurement of military equipment. Miles, could you tell us a bit about Li Shangfu, who he is, his relationship to Xi Jinping and why you think he's gone missing?
Miles Yu:
Li Shangfu was the senior PLA leader who was responsible for a long time for armament and equipment. It was in that role that he did elicit arms deal with Russia who was under sanctioned. So for that reason he was sanctioned by the United States government and I think other spite Xi Jinping picked him as defense minister hoping that the US would have to relive his sanction on him. That didn't happen. So he become a very big inconvenience in global military engagement, not just United States, but also United States allies would have a major problem have had a problem meeting with a sanctioned defense minister of China. His removal could indicate that China's intention to broaden its military engagement with other countries. But I don't believe for a moment that he was sacked because of corruption. I mean, if that's the case, they could have found out this corruption cases long before he was even given the position in charge of the equipment and the armament even before the Defense Minister post. Defense Minister is relatively unimportant post anyways, it's through a ceremonial dealing with political issues with the foreign counterparts. But most importantly I think it's also indicated that Xi Jinping's increasing paranoia over a military disloyalty. This is particularly acute after the Wagner insurrection in Russia and you can see immediately after the Wagner insurrection in Russia and the PLA Rocket Force Chiefs were all sacked. This is another episode of Xi Jinping's paranoia behavior, so it shouldn't be a surprise to everybody.
Shane Leary:
I want to press a bit further and ask you what you think Xi Jinping's thinking is here. Just generally with these disappearances, I mean to the rest of the world, it looks insane that high level officials would simply go missing like this one can't even imagine. For example, a US Secretary of State Qin Gang's equivalent going missing and quietly being replaced without a word from the US government. Is Xi blind to the fact that these actions are seriously out of step with the rest of the international community and that they erode his legitimacy as a leader in the eyes of other countries? Does he simply not care, or rather as his control so fragile and his situation so desperate that he simply sets these concerns aside?
Miles Yu:
We have to understand the internal mechanism of how the government in China works. Xi really doesn't care about what outside the world, look at how he purchase so-and-so. There's always a convenient cover of anti-corruption. Now we have to understand General Li Shangfu is among the very few so-called second generation reds. In other words, he had this communist gene. His father was a long marcher, marched with Mao, so he had this kind of a communist hereditary blue blood or red blood in this case. And that is what Xi Jinping worry about most because with that kind of credential, if there is any kind of disenchantment within the PLA, which there has been a lot considering how many senior military officials have been sacked by Xi Jinping, it's very likely people like General Li with a perfect red credential could become the place to go to for the dissenting China officers to basically vent their displeasure.
So Li could potentially be a leader in this anti faction within the PLA. Now this is all in his head, but this is what exactly he's fear about and he has been doing this consistently, starting with the purging of the Communist Party, Viceroy of Chongqing Bo Xilai, and then you can go on and on to now. And there has been rumor about another second generation red within the PLA high command who is even more senior to Li, that is a vice chairman, Zhang Yuxia, vice chairman of CMC. He has been missing too. So there's been a lot of rumors that he's also in trouble with Xi. This is an endless cycle of purge after purge. It's a perfectly logical if you read the Chinese Communist Party history.
Shane Leary:
In other news, China's current foreign minister, Wong y met with Biden's national security advisor, Jake Sullivan for two days of dialogue in Malta this past weekend. Both sides have said the conversations were candid, substantive, and constructive miles. We've heard optimism like this before. We have had these consistent cabinet level meetings throughout the summer and yet tensions seem to increase between the US and China despite this. In your estimation, was this meeting any different?
Miles Yu:
If you see the readouts by both White House and Chinese government, the information is quite uninformative, but there is a particular background to this meeting was meant to bargain and negotiated conditions for XI to attend the November 2023 APEC meeting in San Francisco as a Asia Pacific Economic Conference, which is to be hosted by President Biden. So this is a big deal since Xi has constantly been playing hard to get, he didn't show up at the G-20 Biden team is eager to engage Xi, but China is really interesting because China now believes openly that engagement and containment by the United States are both part of the US conspiracy, and it demands the White House to show sincerity in engaging China. I mean, how do you show your sincerity when you say, I want to meet the Secretary General Xi? If China has its way what the white would show its sincerity, that would mean total submission to China's demands and return to the good old days of appeasement.
This is not going to happen. If you look at the Wang Yi, he really does not as much power as people think. Yes, he’s China's foreign policies czar, but today's Ministry of Foreign Affairs is not doing its job which is supposed to show the civilized or diplomatic side of one country's national policy. No, right now under Xi China's national policy is one of uncivilized hooligan and mafia nature. So if you look at the foreign ministry in China, it's often hijacked by either its own nasty and mendacious wolf warriors such as those spokesperson who are kind of clownish, or they were ordered to carry out a foreign policy by China's security agencies, particularly the Ministry of State Security. The Ministry of State Security has been publishing foreign policy articles in China, which basically it says that in many, many of China's recent engagement with the United States are driven and operated by directives from the MSS.
For example, the MSS directive in early September. It says China should never give in to us double tricks of engagement plus containment. You show sort of a good policy to stop China from behave in an malign way, and that's containment and you want to be nice to China, engage with them like the Biden team wants to do. And they also say that's just the part of the conspiracy in disguise. The MSS also urge nationwide mobilization of catching foreign spies. This all really is doing what foreign ministry is supposedly doing, but it's hijacked by the national security apparatus inside China. I even would venture to guess that the sing of many of the senior leaders, including Foreign Minister Qin Gang for example, may have something to do with clashing with those mafia figures in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. But I think real problem, I think Jake Sullivan has faced in dealing with China, if the Biden team wants Xi Jinping to come to San Francisco because Xi Jinping, wherever he goes, he wants to be treated like the emperor of the world, the most prominent global leader and not just one of the ordinary member states leaders.
So his egomaniac displeasure at the South Africa BRICS, for example, a few weeks ago it showed this very, very well. One of the reason that he didn't want to show up in India is because India refused to treat him like the emperor of the world. Another thing is difficulty that us faces in arranging meeting with Xi is that Xi Jinping is perhaps the only national leader in major international summits of any kind who does not speak any foreign language in general, and English in particular. He's someone with only elementary school education. So he's very awkward and uncomfortable when it comes to international summits. There's another side of this is that the China's national security paranoia is really bizarre because I think that Jake Sullivan probably talked with Wang Yi about the logistics for the world's emperor to San Francisco. You look at the Xi Jinping trip to Johannesburg in South Africa for the BRICS summit a few weeks ago, for example, Xi Jinping’s entourage was ridiculous.
It involves a 500 personnel security detail and they have to check in to two Chinese owned hotels, and all furniture bed, sheets, phone set, shower towels that Xi will use during this bricks summit had to be flown in from China. All of Xi Jinping's personal discharges in the bathroom were collected by the Chinese security team to preclude any DNA or biometric information from being collected by China's enemies and foreign spies, real or imagined. So we know all this because South Africa's security chief went on TV and with great bemusement, he talk about this difficulty dealing with China's security detail. So I'm sure that when Xi Jinping, if he wants to come to San Francisco, the ultimate enemy zone from the Chinese CCP perspective, he would have to demand enormous security guarantee like the one, even more than one he did to the South Africans.
Shane Leary:
Do you expect the US to capitulate to these demands for royal treatment? Would that even be prudent from the US perspective and what would be the best that we could expect out of a meeting like this in terms of US-China relations?
Miles Yu:
I think JI has to come down from the sky and to the earth and realize that he's just one of the million leaders. He's not emperor of the world. So hopefully that the White House could persuade him to come to San Francisco to deal with the real issues. There was a lot of issues China played a very important, real crucial role from global health point of view from global security and supply chain. This engagement. Unfortunately, China sees all sorts of US action toward China as part of this anti CCP conspiracy, and this is basically, China does not behave like a big country. It shouldn’t be, in my view, I don't think China should be qualified to sit in a security council as a permanent member because it acts like a giant cry baby. And that's what it is.
Shane Leary:
Well, Miles, I think that's all the time we have for this week. Thanks so much for sitting down and talking with me and I look forward to doing this again next week.
Miles Yu:
Okay, thank you and see you next week.
Shane Leary:
Thanks for listening to this week's episode of China Insider. For Chinese language listeners, be sure to check out our monthly Chinese language episodes. And for those who prefer written analysis, subscribe to our weekly newsletter. China digests the best place to stay up to date on miles analysis and the latest news on China. As always, you can stay up to date on the China Center's activities at www.hudson.org.