Beijing decries Washington’s ‘stubborn’ suppression push

Disputes over trade and South China Sea remain sticking points as Blinken arrives for visit today

Beijing accused Washington of “stubbornly” pushing to contain China and hit out over the South China Sea and trade, a day before US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is due to arrive in the country.

In a briefing yesterday, a foreign ministry official said the US had taken measures to suppress China’s economy and trade, which had “seriously harmed” Chinese interests, according to a report on state broadcaster CCTV.

“This is not removing risks but creating risks,” said the official, from the foreign ministry’s North American and Oceanian affairs department, who was not named.

“The United States is stubbornly advancing its strategy to contain China and continues to adopt wrong words and deeds that interfere in China’s internal affairs, smear China’s image, and harm China’s interests.”

Blinken’s visit – from today to Friday – comes as the US has aired growing concerns over China’s industrial overcapacity.

Earlier this month, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen pressed her Chinese counterparts on “unfair practices” and pushed for a level playing field for American firms during her China visit.

Washington has since called for a tripling of import tariffs on Chinese steel and aluminium, and launched an investigation into alleged subsidies in the shipbuilding, logistics and maritime industries.

The foreign ministry official dismissed Washington’s allegations of Chinese overcapacity as a “false narrative”, saying it was “outright economic coercion and bullying”.

“Behind it is the evil intention of curbing and suppressing China’s industrial development, aiming to seek a more favourable competitive position and market advantage for the country,” the official said.

The official was outlining areas Beijing will focus on during Blinken’s visit – his second in less than a year. They included seeking more dialogue with the US, deepening cooperation, and working together on global issues as major powers including the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.

He said Washington was “obsessed” with forming an antiChina bloc and Beijing would make clear its position on issues including Taiwan, trade, science and technology, and the South China Sea during this week’s talks.

China also opposed American interference in the South China Sea and the US “sowing discord” between Beijing and its Southeast Asian neighbours, the official said.

Beijing’s claims to most of the South China Sea overlap with those of other countries. Tensions between China and the Philippines over the waterway have risen in recent months, pushing Manila closer to Washington. The two this week began their largest combat exercise in years, involving more than 16,000 military personnel.

“The United States is not a party to the South China Sea issue and should not intervene, let alone disrupt the situation,” the official said.

Ambassador to the US Xie Feng, meanwhile, has also taken aim at US policies towards China.

“It would be self-deluding to suppress and encircle China in the name of competition on one hand, and try to manage competition and avoid direct conflict on the other,” Xie said in a conversation late last week with Harvard professor Graham Allison. “If we only aim at the minimum goal of avoiding conflict in China-US relations, then we would not be far away from going into one.”

Xie also said the two powers had agreed to hold talks on “national security boundaries” after Xi and Biden met in San Francisco, but the US was reluctant to have detailed discussions.

Those consultations have not previously been mentioned and were not in statements from either side following the leaders’ meeting in November.

Lu Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the atmosphere this week was likely to be tense. He said US actions – including a trilateral summit with the Philippines and Japan this month – were viewed as targeting China.

Jeremy Chan, a senior analyst at political risk consultancy Eurasia Group, said it appeared “patience is wearing thin” with the state of US-China ties.

He did not expect much from the visit, but noted that “the two sides are communicating again at almost every level”. “These ‘guard rails’ won’t by themselves prevent a rupture in the relationship, but they will serve as shock absorbers to soften the blow when the next crisis moment arrives.”

China showed off its nuclear second-strike capability – the ability to hit back after an enemy launches an initial nuclear attack – just two days before US Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s visit to Beijing and Shanghai.

On Monday, the Chinese navy released rare footage of the launch of a JL-2 ballistic missile from a nuclear submarine. The video shows the Shandong aircraft carrier fleet, including four submarines, during a simulated exercise. A ballistic missile is shown being launched after a narrator says “the submarine has arrived at the scheduled launch location … and is commanded to carry out a fatal strike”.

While the video does not identify the type of missile or submarine, nationalist tabloid Global Times said the missile in the video was the JL-2 submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM), which was displayed for the first time during a military parade in 2019.

With a range of 7,400km, the JL-2 became China’s first credible sea-based nuclear deterrent when it was deployed on Type 094A nuclear submarines in 2015.

Compared with land-based missiles, SLBMs generally allow for a greater chance of surviving an initial strike by an enemy and conducting a second strike.

The JL-2, if operated in the mid-Pacific Ocean, is able to threaten targets in the western half of the continental United States, as well as Hawaii and Alaska, and it can threaten targets on the east coast of the US if deployed east of Hawaii, according to a Pentagon report published last year.

The video was released to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Chinese navy and came just ahead of Blinken’s visit to China starting today.

The video shows a simulated exercise between two aircraft carrier groups, including one led by the Shandong, China’s second aircraft carrier, which was launched in 2017. The footage is the first confirmation that the Shandong carrier group includes at least four submarines, including a nuclear one.

The video shows the three submarines conducting “cover-up” missions, with one of them launching an unmanned underwater vehicle before a fourth nuclear submarine successfully launches the missile.

According to the Pentagon report, the Chinese navy now operates six nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs), six nuclear-powered attack submarines, and 48 dieselpowered or air-independent propulsion attack submarines.

China’s Jin-class Type 094 SSBNs can also deploy JL-3 SLBMs, which would allow submarines armed with this missile to target the continental US from Chinese waters, the report said.