Xi Jinping’s ‘ Wolf Warrior’ arrogance will be the downfall of China

Exactly what is Xi Jinping up to? As the PRC’s supreme leader, he’s centralised as much power as any Qing Dynasty Emperor. He’s proven himself to be an enormously ambitious, disciplined, and tenacious president, managing even to muscle his way into an unprecedented third five- year term as Secretary General of the Chinese Communist Party.

The West is quick to question what grand purpose this reservoir of power serves. Xi’s increasingly belligerent foreign policy may hold the answers. The Chinese premier has hosted an endless string of US Cabinet Secretaries, only to send each on home largely empty handed. He visited South Africa to attend a Brics meeting aimed at recruiting countries to an anti- Western club. He’s declined an invitation to the G20 summit in India to spite Modi. And he’s maintained his love affair with Vladimir Putin, despite his murderous invasion of Ukraine. We can understand why Xi wishes to confect an axis of autocrats against confederating liberal democratic allies. But it; s hard to understand why he has so systematically and unnecessarily alienated many of the countries once willing to support China’s rise. These alienations stretch back to Xi’s reaffirmation of China’s so- called “nine dash line” that claims the South China Sea as a core issue, leaving Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei and the Philippines on tenterhooks.

Since then, Beijing has punished Norway by blocking salmon imports after imprisoned dissident Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010; halted vital shipments of rare earths to Japan after a fishing dispute in 2010, halted Chinese tourism to the ROK, cancelled K- Pop tours to China after Seoul approved a US THAD anti- missile system against the DPRK in 2017; arbitrarily detained two Canadians and cancelled agricultural contracts after Huawei’s Meng Wanshou was detained in Vancouver for extradition to the US in 2018, and cancelled imports of coal, wine, beef, barley and rock lobster after Australia called for an independent study of the coronavirus source in 2021. Such punitive retaliations are part of China’s ongoing “Wolf Warrior diplomacy.” While this may make Xi feel more like a great power leader, his actions are making countries reconsider their own interpretation of “engagement” with China. Nowhere is this more true than in the US. Gallup polls showed a favorability rating for China of 72 per cent in early 1989. By 2022, it had dropped to 15 per cent. It’s true that China has always had a conflicted relationship with America – but why then gratuitously alienate Norway, India, Canada, Korea, and Australia, all nations that have tried to maintain non- aligned positions?

These increasingly negative international perceptions are not helped by Xi’s mismanagement of China’s economy, once considered near- invincible. The property market is in crisis, leaving local governments that have long been dependent on land sales for revenue mired in debt. Foreign buyers, while still dependent on Chinese supply chains, have begun pulling muchneeded investment – all while local entrepreneurs continue to face domestic persecution. Little wonder, then, that China’s wealthy have been quietly heading for exile. As our globalised economy separates into two ever more divided, ideological, and well- armed blocks, we are left to wonder: why, after inheriting one of the greatest developmental success stories in history, has Xi Jinping willfully dragged his country towards ruin? To answer this we must have a better understanding of Xi both as a political leader and as a person. His “China Dream” and fixation on a national rejuvenation offers some clues. For Xi, China’s “greatness” can only be restored through strong Leninist- style leadership and heightened nationalist vigilance against those latter- day “great powers” who would now like subvert China and its one- party state. Xi’s deeply rooted anti- imperialist culture of grievance compromises his ability to use diplomatic tools. After all, the heart of diplomacy is give- andtake, but Xi sees “give” as an expression of weakness, and “take” as an expression of strength. Like many talented but compromised figures from history, Xi is constrained by his paranoia and abiding fear of losing face. But he does still have some cards left to play. China is a technologically advanced nation with an excellent infrastructure on which many other countries now depend on economically. The CCP is a welloiled, if unpredictable, juggernaut of highly disciplined energy, and the PRC remain a serious military threat. All of this is true - but, beset by a host of self- generated problems, Xi’s overweening ambition and arrogant missteps have now left him increasingly vulnerable.

As the chorus ending Sophocles’ play “Antigone” warns, “The arrogant pay for their arrogant proud words with great downfalls!” It would be an enormous tragedy if, after so much suffering and striving by the Chinese people, Xi’s grandiose pretensions and stubborn arrogance once again left their nation poor and isolated.