Tag Archive for: China

BRICS is hardly a new fulcrum of world politics

One question that 2025 may begin to answer is whether the BRICS group (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) is becoming the new center of power in world politics. Now that it has added new members (Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates) and come to represent 45 percent of the world population, some believe that it is consolidating the (misleadingly named) Global South and posing a serious challenge to US and Western power. But I remain skeptical of such claims.

When Jim O’Neill, then the chief economist at Goldman Sachs, coined the ‘BRIC’ acronym in 2001, his aim was simply to identify the four emerging economies that were most likely to dominate global economic growth by 2050. But the label soon acquired a political relevance. BRIC became an informal diplomatic grouping at the 2006 United Nations General Assembly and then a formal organisation in 2009, with the first BRIC Summit. Hosted in Russia, the focus then, as it is now, was on advancing a multipolar world order. At the end of the following year, the group got its ‘S’ when South Africa joined.

A Wall Street asset class evolved into an international organisation partly because it aligned with Russia’s and China’s own aspirations to lead the developing world. The BRICS 16th summit in Russia in October 2024 was the first to include its new members. (Saudi Arabia has not yet decided whether to accept the group’s invitation to join, and Argentina’s new government declined.) Some 36 national leaders attended, as did representatives from many international organisations, including UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, and Turkey used the occasion to present its own application for membership.

The 2024 summit focused on fostering ties across the Global South and building a multipolar world, with Russian President Vladimir Putin using the occasion to demonstrate his global diplomatic relevance despite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

With more countries showing an interest in joining, it looks like the BRICS could indeed present itself as a leader of the resistance to the US-dominated international order. Some even see it as the successor to the Cold War-era Non-Aligned Movement, whose members refused to choose between the United States and the Soviet Union. But while NAM had a shared interest in resisting the US, it did not have Russia and China as founding members.

In any case, the BRICS is unlikely to succeed in formally organising the so-called Global South. Not only do its largest and most important members—China, India and Russia—all lie north of the equator, but the three are competing for leadership.

Russia and China do have a common interest in countering what they see as an American threat, and they have declared an ‘alliance without limits’. But such slogans mask major differences in their strategic perspectives. While Russia took vast swaths of territory from China in the 19th century, when the Qing dynasty was weak, China’s economy is now 10 times the size of Russia’s. Both countries are vying for influence in Central Asia, and China is uneasy about Russia’s recruitment of its neighbor North Korea to fight in Ukraine.

An even more important limit on the BRICS as an organisation is the rivalry between China and India, which is now the world’s most populous country. Although China is much wealthier than India, it is experiencing demographic decline (like Russia), while India’s population and workforce continue to grow.

Moreover, China and India share a disputed boundary in the Himalayas, where their forces have clashed repeatedly, and the situation is further complicated by China’s traditional friendship with Pakistan. In fact, an abiding concern about China is one reason why India participates in the BRICS in the first place. While it avoids formal alliances, it has also stepped up its participation in the Quad (whose other members are the US, Japan and Australia) for the same reason.

Rather than making the BRICS stronger, the admission of new members merely imports more rivalries. Egypt and Ethiopia are locked in a dispute over a dam that Ethiopia is building on the Nile River, and Iran has long-standing disputes with the UAE and prospective member Saudi Arabia. Far from making the BRICS more effective, these new intra-organisational rivalries will hamper its efforts. The Group of 77 developing countries has even more members, and it is chronically limited by internal divisions.

At their 2024 summit, BRICS+ discussed matters such as economic and security cooperation, promotion of cultural exchanges, and joint development projects focused on infrastructure and sustainability. But such talk usually does not yield significant results. In 2014, the group established the New Development Bank, which is headquartered in Shanghai; but the institution has had only modest results to date.

Likewise, the group’s stated intention of avoiding the dollar and clearing more of its members’ bilateral trade in their own currencies has made only limited headway. Any serious attempt to replace the dollar as a global reserve currency would require China to back the yuan with deep, flexible capital markets and the rule of law—and those conditions are nowhere close to being met.

So, what is the BRICS good for? As a means of escaping diplomatic isolation, it is certainly useful to Russia. As a diplomatic device for projecting leadership of the developing world, it also has been useful to China. As a channel through which to counterbalance China, it has its uses for India. And as a modest stage for touting national development, it has sometimes been useful to Brazil and South Africa. But do these functions make it a new fulcrum of world politics? I think not.

Editors’ picks for 2024: ‘Australia’s climate ambitions have a modern slavery problem: examining the origins of our big batteries’

Originally published on 6 September 2024. Republication of this report today follows news on 6 January 2025 that the US Defense Department had added CATL to its list of companies that work with the Chinese military.

Several big battery projects in Australia vital for storing renewable energy to meet the nation’s climate goals are highly likely to be using materials sourced through the forced labour of Uyghur and other Turkic ethnic groups in China, ASPI research has found.

ASPI has examined the supply chains for big battery projects across various Australian states and found that, even when the batteries are sourced from US-based companies, critical components are still obtained from Chinese suppliers. These suppliers carry well-documented risks of involvement in human rights abuses.

Australia needs big batteries because its renewable energy plans require storage for intermittent sources such as wind, solar and hydro. That’s why state and territory governments are pouring billions of dollars into battery energy storage systems (BESS), also known as big batteries.

However, most of the global battery supply is controlled by companies based in the People’s Republic of China and is dependent on raw materials mined and processed in Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region (XUAR).  Two of the largest companies that supply batteries and lithium cells for batteries—Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. (CATL) and EVE—are used in Australian projects in spite of having been reported to be implicated in grave human rights violations, notably forced labour of Uyghur and other Turkic ethnic groups in the manufacturing and processing of raw materials. In a damning 2022 report, the United Nations stated that such violations might constitute crimes against humanity.

Our findings indicate that a legislative or policy directive is required to ensure that the default for Australian companies and governments is to source batteries that are guaranteed not to involve forced labour. Only then can Australia reach its climate goals without that success coming at the expense of human rights.

This directive should compel Australian governments to act as model contractors and incentivise and require private sector partners to undertake appropriate due diligence. It would mean mandating that project owners and operators know the origins, sources and supply chains of the batteries and their materials and are able to confirm they do not carry the risk of human rights abuses. When dealing with countries known to engage in modern slavery, such as China, it cannot be sufficient to say there is no evidence of forced labour. Rather, the supply chain must be known to be free of these risks.

If this work does not provide complete confidence, then the battery suppliers should not be used.

Understanding Chinese battery supply chains is indeed notoriously difficult. Faced with scrutiny from foreign governments and non-government researchers, Chinese companies often obscure their supply chains through intricate webs of suppliers and corporate affiliations, creating significant challenges for consumers and regulators trying to trace the origins of materials and labour. But difficult doesn’t mean impossible.

In June 2022, The New York Times uncovered that Xinjiang Nonferrous Metal Industry (Group), a Chinese state-owned enterprise, was directly exploiting forced Uyghur labour in the mining sector under the guise of a surplus labour transfer program. And in September 2023, the Washington Post detailed concerns about forced labour within the supply chains of several electric vehicle companies, including Tesla, Ford and Volkswagen.

One of the supply chains examined by the Washington Post involved CATL (宁德时代新能源科技股份有限公司), the world’s largest EV battery maker, which has contracts with seven major global automakers.

CATL attracted the scrutiny of US lawmakers in February 2023 after it struck a deal with automaker Ford. The scrutiny prompted the battery company to ostensibly divest its ownership stake in Xinjiang Zhicun Lithium (新疆志存锂业有限公司), a company reported to be connected to forced labour practices in Xinjiang. Zhicun produces lithium carbonate, which is central to the manufacture of lithium-ion batteries, from its facilities in Xinjiang.

However, while CATL officially divested from Zhicun, it continued to exercise significant control or guidance over the company’s operations through a series of holding companies and by the appointment of Guan Chaoyu as a manager of Zhicun’s new shareholder company, Chendao Capital. Guan also holds positions in several companies where CATL has invested, according to two US House of Representatives’ Select Committees.

ASPI’s research now reveals that despite the official divestment, CATL and Zhicun also continue to collaborate through a joint subsidiary, Wanzai Shidai Zhicun New Energy Materials Co., Ltd. (万载时代志存新能源材料有限公司), established in July 2022 with a registered capital of 1 billion yuan (A$211 million). This company is jointly held by Yichun Shidai New Energy Resources Co., Ltd., which is fully owned by CATL, and Zhicun Lithium Industry, with shareholding ratios of 80 percent and 20 percent, respectively.

In August 2023, a group of Republican lawmakers called on the US Department of Homeland Security to add CATL and associated companies to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List, citing their connections to coercive labour transfer programs in Xinjiang that were first outlined in a December 2022 report by Laura T. Murphy and others at Sheffield Hallam University. In June, lawmakers accused CATL and another Chinese firm Gotion of ‘state-sponsored slave labour’ and called for them to be added to a US import ban list.

While the spotlight on companies like CATL and their potential reliance on modern slavery has focused on the electric vehicle industry and the involvement of companies like Ford, Tesla and BYD, the overlap of supply chains means the same human rights risks extend to large-scale battery energy storage systems, such as those being constructed across Australia.

Despite what is publicly known, Australian governments and companies in almost all states are readily engaging with CATL, EVE and companies that use their products.

The responsibility for the projects and the selection of providers is complex.

At Collie, in Western Australia, two major battery projects are being built.

One is being built by French company NEOEN using Tesla Megapack batteries. The project is split into stage 1 and stage 2—with the contracts for both awarded by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), which is jointly operated by the Commonwealth, state and territory governments, and industry.

The second project is being developed by energy company Synergy, which is wholly owned by the WA government. In September 2023, the WA government announced it had awarded contracts exceeding $1 billion to CATL directly for the Synergy projects at Collie and another site, Kwinana. Both stages one and two of the Kwinana project use CATL batteries.

Meanwhile, in New South Wales, the most significant project is the 850-MWh Waratah Super Battery near Newcastle, supplied by Powin, a US-based company. Powin’s batteries are supplied with lithium cells made by CATL and EVE, another Chinese battery manufacturer. A quick Google search would have revealed that, earlier this year, Swedish research on human rights due diligence found that ‘through equity ownership, joint operations, and collaborations, EVE’s products are also linked to the oppression of ethnic Turkic groups in Xinjiang’.

In Queensland, the government is building a 300MWh big battery through the publicly owned energy company Stanwell, in partnership with Tesla, near Rockhampton. These Tesla Megapack big batteries and EV batteries are made with lithium-ion cells that are made by CATL.

CATL batteries have also been used in other renewable energy projects in Victoria, such as the Phillip Island Battery Energy Storage System, established in 2022, and the IKEA power project in South Australia, established in 2020. NEOEN also operates the Victorian Big Battery, the largest BESS in Victoria.

This raises the question of what requirements governments are putting on major battery suppliers such as Tesla and Powin, and the project owners and operators. There is ample public documentation to show that projects in WA, SA, NSW, VIC and QLD are using battery packs with lithium cells produced by CATL and EVE.

Australia’s stance against human rights abuses and proclaimed global leadership in combating modern slavery should dictate that both governments and companies make it a condition of their contracts with suppliers—even US companies such as Tesla and Powin—that the battery packs provided to Australia are not sourced from any country that engages in these human rights violations. Yes, such goods made in North America and Europe may be more expensive, but that is in part because corporations from these regions have to abide by stricter labour laws and human rights protections.

ASPI sought responses from a wide range of Australian and international entities responsible for the projects, including state governments, energy companies and the Australian Energy Market Operator.

The Victorian Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action referred questions to NEOEN. The Clean Energy Finance Corporation, a federal government green bank that invests in clean energy and contributed $160 million in investment to the Victorian Big Battery, said it made risk-based assessments of the modern slavery risk associated with investments by conducting due diligence on relevant partners and supply chain participants. It said this included consideration of publicly available information such as academic and international reports including ASPI’s own research. It also queried suppliers about their modern slavery risk management practices.

NSW EnergyCo, the statutory authority responsible for the state’s renewable energy project planning, provided a background statement pointing to the Renewable Energy Sector Board plan that states project proponents are required to provide evidence that they have registered a modern slavery statement with the Australian Border Force and that their registered modern slavery statement is compliant with the Commonwealth Modern Slavery Act. (2018) It referred questions about batteries’ manufacturing to Powin.

The WA Department of Energy, Mines, Industry, Regulation and Safety referred questions to public company Synergy, which did not respond by the deadline, and to NEOEN.

The Queensland Department of Energy and Climate referred questions to public company Stanwell, which pointed us to its modern slavery statement. The most recent statement, covering 2022-23, said that of their ‘tier two’ suppliers—that is, those that are one step removed from directly supplying Stanwell—70 percent had suppliers in countries considered high risk for slavery, but none of the key suppliers had self-reported any problems. However, Stanwell did not respond to our direct written questions about Tesla and CATL.

NEOEN declined to comment. Tesla and Powin did not respond to written questions.

AEMO said it could not comment on specific projects and referred questions to project owners for queries on investment and materials.

CATL provided a written statement saying that it has never bought any products from Xinjiang Zhicun. It said it had never owned any interest nor exercised control in its operations. It further said that based on its ‘investigation and fact-checking, Xinjiang Zhicun has never engaged in any forced labor activities’. It said it worked with Jiangxi Jinhui, a subsidiary of Xinjiang Zhicun’s parent company Jiangxi Zhicun, to process lepidolite, which is a lithium-bearing mineral, in Jiangxi Province. CATL’s emphatic response contradicts the substantial media reporting, academic research and investigations done by members of the US Congress, making it highly doubtful that Australian governments and companies should derive any confidence from it as a guide to the risks of these supply chains.

This is a known problem with a known solution. It requires Australian governments and their contracted suppliers to do adequate due diligence. When battery supply chains involve Chinese suppliers, there is a high risk of exposure to forced labour that is deliberately hidden through shell companies and obscured local ownership and shareholder arrangements. This necessitates a different approach to due diligence: not  a ‘tick-box’ approach to compliance but one that puts a burden of proof on suppliers and procurers to assure supply chains are verifiably free from modern slavery. If that can’t be done, these products should not be permitted in Australia.

With China’s dominance of the battery supply chain, sourcing from other countries is difficult, though not impossible—at least not yet. Australia could introduce a procurement requirement that companies and governments building and operating big battery projects stipulate in contracts that their suppliers source all components through processes and from regions that are free from forced labour risks.

The Australian government and its partners—in particular the US, Japan and Korea, all of whom have some capacity in this area—should collaborate to reduce the near-monopoly level of Chinese control (which begins at the scientific research stage). This would be the only way the Australian government could achieve its stated objectives to ‘diversify global battery supply chains’ and ‘to ensure Australia builds sovereign capabilities’, while also ‘taking a global leadership role in combating modern slavery’.

In addition, given the known threat of economic coercion from Beijing, Australia should consider its reliance on Chinese battery suppliers as a strategic vulnerability, against our national interest. The nation’s climate goals necessitate robust energy storage solutions, but they cannot come at the expense of human rights. The documented use of forced Uyghur labour in Chinese battery supply chains, potentially constituting crimes against humanity, underscores the urgency for Australian companies and policymakers to prioritise trusted, reliable and secure sourcing. By prioritising alternatives to Chinese batteries, Australia can lead not only in renewable energy innovation but also in upholding global standards of human dignity and justice.

From the bookshelf: ‘The Taiwan Story: how a small island will dictate the global future’

Among the most complex foreign policy challenges facing President Donald Trump following his inauguration on 20 January will be relations with China and the US’s position relative to Taiwan.

Perhaps no better book informs political debate and public opinion than Kerry Brown’s The Taiwan Story:  How a small island will dictate the global future (Viking, 2024). Brown is a prolific author of books on Chinese politics, currently based at King’s College, London, following a stint at the University of Sydney.

The Taiwan Story begins with the Chinese Civil War (1945–49), in which Mao Zedong’s communists ousted Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalists from the mainland and establish the People’s Republic of China. Chiang’s forces retreated to the island of Taiwan as the Republic of China. The US government sided with the Republic of China, with which it maintained diplomatic relations, not recognising Beijing.

The story evolves when the US switches recognition from Taipei to Beijing, following the 1972 visit to China by US President Richard Nixon and his national security advisor, Henry Kissinger. Thus began the US ‘acknowledgement’ of the one-China policy. According to the Shanghai Communique of 1972, ‘the United States acknowledges that Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China.’

Beijing’s insistence that Taiwan be united with the mainland has made the island Asia’s political flash point. A plethora of books have been published on Taiwan issues. What is most interesting about Brown’s is that he goes into the lives of the Taiwanese people and how Taiwanese politics, society and cultural identity have evolved quite differently to the mainland’s.

Chiang Kai-shek’s government on Taiwan was just as authoritarian as that of Mao Zedong on the Chinese mainland. But Taiwan democratised, holding its first presidential elections in 1996. Democracy is now firmly entrenched in Taiwan, as the presidency has alternated between the two leading political parties, the Kuomintang (the nationalists) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

The Economist Intelligence Unit ranks Taiwan as the most democratic place in Asia and 10th in the world. Democratisation means that Taiwan has aligned its values with the West and distinguishes itself from China, which has become ever more authoritarian. Taiwan also has a rich, open and free civil society, something that is very much lacking on the mainland.

Taiwan has also established itself among Asia’s technology leaders.  Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company produces more than 90 percent of the world’s most advanced semiconductors. Under US pressure, the company will not supply them to Chinese customers.

While Taiwan may be diplomatically isolated, with only 12 countries recognising it as the Republic of China, much of the world economy is depends on its technological prowess. And over the generations, a distinct Taiwanese cultural identity has developed, with the vast majority of Taiwanese people identifying as Taiwanese, rather than Chinese or both Chinese and Taiwanese.

Meanwhile, there is a growing risk of military conflict involving China and Taiwan. Chinese leader Xi Jinping is increasingly impatient for Taiwan to be unified with the mainland. As China–US relations have deteriorated, high-level US support for Taiwan has grown, even though Washington maintains its policy of ‘strategic ambiguity’ concerning its willingness to defend Taiwan. Most Taiwanese prefer the political status quo of de facto independence, as do the current president and his predecessor (both from the Democratic Progressive Party). In response, Beijing has cut off all official contact with Taipei.

What future for relations across the Taiwan Straits?

Brown explores issues and risks of a military conflict over Taiwan. It would be massively risky and costly, not only for the countries directly involved but for the whole world economy. Brown sees no possibility of reconciliation between China and Taiwan. But he does argue that peace across the Taiwan Straits has been ensured for seven decades by accepting the status quo and that sticking with it is the only realistic option. This would involve all sides dialling down the tensions, however.

Brown notes that both China and Taiwan have undergone radical change over the past half a century or more. Looking further ahead, he argues that it is highly possible that continued radical change will throw up new ideas which could offer a longer term solution to the Taiwan problem.

China’s big new combat aircraft: an airborne cruiser against air and surface targets

The speed, agility, range and stealth of an individual aircraft type are still important, but they’re no longer the whole story of air combat. Advances in sensing, processing and communications are changing military operations.

The Chengdu J-36, the big Chinese combat aircraft that first appeared on 26 December, has been developed to exploit these changes and support China’s strategic goal: to establish regional dominance, including the ability to annex Taiwan by force.

If J-36s can fly supersonically without using afterburning, as the prototype’s shape suggests they will, each will be able to get into and out of battle faster and more safely than conventional fighters and bombers, which cruise subsonically. A high degree of stealth will greatly help J-36s in penetrating defences. Supersonic cruise would also mean each J-36 could fly more missions in a given period.

The design’s big main weapon bays are sized for considerable air-to-surface missiles, which J-36s could launch against such targets as airfields, aircraft carriers and air-defence batteries. With great speed and height, J-36s could also throw inexpensive glide bombs farther than other aircraft could.

The main weapon bays are big enough to carry unusually large air-to-air missiles for engaging aircraft at great range, including vital support units such as tankers and air-surveillance radar planes. Targeting data for this might come from other aircraft, ships, satellites or ground sources. The missiles might also be launched at fighters at ranges that keep J-36s safe from counterattack.

J-36s are themselves likely to be sources of targeting data for other aircraft and for ships, using large passive and active sensors that aircraft of such size can easily carry. They may command aircraft that fly with them. In all this, they’d use radio links that are hard for an enemy to detect.

To call the J-36 an airborne cruiser may not be far off the mark—and may call into question the West’s decision to prioritise development and production of fighters that are, by comparison, mere torpedo boats.

(An earlier article in this series technically assesses the design of the J-36. The type’s designation is likely but not certain.)

For the Taiwan mission, China’s principal opposing force is US-led air power, comprising the US Air Force and the US Navy’s aircraft carriers, with support from Japan, Australia, Taiwan and maybe South Korea and others. Air power from China’s opponents can hinder its maritime and amphibious operations, resulting in slower progress and higher casualties.

So, counter-air capability is crucial for China. This is what the US thinks of as China’s anti-access and area denial capability. It includes surface-to-air weapons, fighters, air-base attacks and the information realm.

To understand where the J-36 fits in, start by considering China’s current force, of which the Chengdu J-20 is the spearhead. The J-20 is fast and stealthy, with good range for a fighter, but its weapon bays are limited to short-range and medium-range air-to-air weapons. Like the F-35, it is more detectable outside its forward quadrant. That becomes a greater vulnerability in a networked environment, where a sensor platform on your beam may not be well placed to launch a weapon but will pass your track to one that is.

The long-range Xi’an H-6 bomber, used as a missile carrier, can launch attacks at air bases throughout the Western Pacific. But its effect is limited to the warheads of up to six costly missiles that must fly far enough to keep their vulnerable launch aircraft safe.

The J-36 combines speed and range with all-aspect stealth. Potential internal loads include such long-range air-to-air missiles as the PL-17, which the J-20 cannot carry internally. Heavier, air-to-surface missiles would be aimed at airfields and warships. It also probably supports the kind of mass-precision attacks made possible by accurate, more autonomous weapons, or—as autonomous technology advances—the carriage of loitering munitions and jammers.

The J-36’s smaller outboard weapon bays might accommodate defensive and support weapons, possibly on extending rails like the J-20’s side bays.

The large transparent side apertures in the forward fuselage could be wide-field-of-view passive warning and cueing systems. But there’s another possibility: if you wanted to integrate a high-energy anti-missile laser into an aircraft, with a hemisphere-plus field of fire but without unstealthy turrets, it might from the outside look like those transparencies. A single optical chain could feed left and right steerable heads under the conformal windows. Cue panic.

Speed is not just valuable for survivability, although it does erode missile engagement envelopes. Even Mach 1.8 supersonic cruise halves flight time and greatly increases sortie rate compared with a subsonic-cruise aircraft.

The US considered developing a supersonic strike aircraft in the early 2000s. But with 9/11 and the cost of the F-35 program, a high-speed project could not get funded. ‘Response time, and cost per target killed, were the two holy grails,’ a Northrop Grumman engineer commented in early 2001. The supersonic aircraft was big and complex, but the sortie generation rate was far higher than that of subsonic alternatives, and fewer aircraft were needed. And it could use cheap, unpowered glide weapons with a stand-off range estimated at 170km from a Mach 2 launch.

Speed on one side of a conflict is an important advantage. If the J-36 can penetrate to threaten bases in the second island chain, forcing the US to move B-21s, B-52s and other high-value assets further back, US strike sortie rate and effectiveness will diminish.

It’s important to keep in mind that the J-36 will be part of a family of systems and a network of capabilities. The appearance over the holiday season of the KJ-3000 airborne early warning and control system, based on the Xi’an Y-20 airlifter, is significant.

China has produced five different airborne radar systems since 2003, more than any other nation, all based on the technology of active electronically scanned arrays (AESAs). It has expanded their role beyond that of forward-passing adversary track data to fighter aircraft. AESA radars can update tracks much faster than a rotating-antenna radar, so these systems can provide guidance-quality midcourse updates to missiles.

Compared with the propeller-driven KJ-500, the KJ-3000 can be moved faster and farther forward to support an operation, and it can fly higher for greater sensor range. Working with a KJ-3000, the J-36s could launch missiles while remaining radar-silent.

If its speed and stealth allow it safely to get close to the enemy, a J-36 itself will be able to provide targeting data to other weapons, such as missiles launched by H-6s that prudently stay well behind it. It will also be the command and control hub for other aircraft, crewed and uncrewed. If it is a two-seater, the second crew member will likely be a force manager.

As for how to classify the J-36, too many people have rushed to call it a ‘sixth-generation fighter’.

The ‘fifth-generation’ term, invented in Russia, was picked up by Lockheed Martin as a marketing tool in the early 2000s. What Lockheed Martin would call 5-gen fighters combine supersonic speed and maneuverability with some degree of stealth. The Chengdu J-20 fighter is fifth-generation by that standard.

But this ‘generation’ taxonomy misleads more than it informs, because combat aircraft designs need not and do not fall into discrete sequential groups of characteristics.

And ‘fighter’, ‘bomber’ and ‘strike’ definitions are getting less clear. Most Boeing F-15s, nominally fighters, have been built as strike aircraft, and the fighter-derived Sukhoi Su-34 is another step down the same path. Designed against air and land threats, the J-36 is even larger than the Su-34. Its size and flight performance put it into its own category, for which there is no name. Maybe ‘airborne cruiser’ will catch on.

Editors’ picks for 2024: ‘Three concessions after three weeks: Prabowo leans China’s way’

Originally published on 15 November 2024.

Indonesia’s new president, Prabowo Subianto, needed only three weeks in office to make three big concessions to China.

In a joint statement with President Xi Jinping in Beijing on 9 November, Prabowo acknowledged Chinese maritime claims that Indonesia had long rejected. Despite leading the most populous Muslim-majority country, he affirmed China’s right to deal with Xinjiang as it pleased. He also endorsed China’s vague vision of the geopolitical order, something that Indonesia has long been wary of.

Indonesia has long rejected China’s nearby territorial assertions in the South China Sea, arguing that they have no basis under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. A 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling against China, which declared its claims illegitimate, became the basis for Indonesia’s campaign against the nine-dash line.

That hasn’t deterred China. Rejecting the ruling, Beijing has persisted in seeking recognition of its claims, particularly from Southeast Asian nations. For years, Indonesia’s diplomats have challenged Beijing, but now the Prabowo-Xi joint statement has sparked fears that this may change.

It said the two nations had ‘reached important common understanding on joint development in areas of overlapping claims.’ The key point is that Indonesia thereby acknowledged China’s claim, giving them some legitimacy. The statement further mentioned an agreement to ‘establish an Inter-governmental Joint Steering Committee to explore and advance relevant cooperation’, indicating mutual interest in jointly exploiting resources in the sea.

The Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs later released a statement clarifying that Indonesia still did not recognise China’s nine-dash line. That won’t stop Beijing from using the joint statement as expressing Indonesia’s capitulation.

This has implications for Indonesia’s broader interests in the South China Sea disputes, including how Indonesia has framed itself as a non-claimant in the disputed waters.

As for Xinjiang, the joint statement affirmed it was an issue of ‘internal affairs of China’ and said that Indonesia ‘firmly supports China’s efforts to maintain development and stability in Xinjiang.’

While Indonesia has always recognised Beijing’s sovereignty over Xinjiang, the province has not previously been directly mentioned in a joint statement by the two countries. This contrasts with Jakarta’s solidarity with the Muslim world in opposing Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

The joint statement seemed to present some new enthusiasm from Indonesia for China’s Global Security Initiative and Global Civilization Initiative, two of three major Chinese initiatives, the third being the Global Development Initiative, that present a Chinese vision of the international order. Indonesia has been willing to support the Global Development Initiative because of potential economic benefits. But it has been reluctant to endorse the other two initiatives due to their vagueness and a concern that doing so may undermine its non-aligned position in world affairs.

Overall, the joint statement reads as a turn towards China, particularly by diminishing the long-term efforts of Indonesian diplomats to preserve the sanctity of international maritime law. Not only does it harm Indonesia’s ability to counter to Chinese claims; it also affects the recently resolved maritime boundary dispute with Vietnam.

The shift is all the more demeaning for Indonesia because it closely followed a series of Chinese coast guard intrusions in late October, the same week Prabowo assumed the presidency.

It had always been apparent that the new Indonesian president, despite his strongman image and past criticism of his predecessor’s approach to the South China Sea, would deal with China cordially. Indonesia has security concerns about Chinese maritime claims, but Prabowo’s concessions was probably economically motivated. This motivation will continue to dominate, since Prabowo is aiming to achieve 8 percent annual economic growth. Indeed, the Beijing visit came with considerable pledges for economic cooperation on green energy and tech, amounting to US$10 billion.

But economic gain does not need to come at the cost of sovereignty. Past Indonesian administrations were able to get economic benefits from China and even the Soviet Union without sacrificing sovereignty.

The joint statement reflects poorly on Indonesia’s new non-career foreign minister, Sugiono. It was likely agreed upon without consulting senior foreign affairs officials. They have worked tirelessly to fight the proposition that China and Indonesia have overlapping claims in the South China Sea and to prevent Indonesia from embracing China’s vision of the international order and its narratives on Xinjiang. If they were consulted, then they were likely overruled.

These developments reflect the diminished role in foreign policymaking of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under Prabowo’s leadership—a risk that we have identified in the past. Traditionally, the ministry has acted as a check on the ability of any single president to unilaterally direct Indonesia’s foreign policy away from its principle of non-alignment.

With the foreign minister now seemingly an extension of Prabowo, but the foreign affairs ministry likely to keep defending long-standing positions, the country’s foreign policy may start to look inconsistent.

Editors’ picks for 2024: ‘Military challenges to Beijing’s South China Sea claims are increasing’

Originally published on 22 October 2024.

Deployments of ships and aircraft to challenge China’s illegal claims in the South China Sea are increasing. European ships are appearing more often, while Asia-Pacific countries are increasingly conducting activities in areas that China regards as sensitive.

Several nations have claims in the South China Sea, but China’s claim is the most extensive and controversial. Beijing seeks to enforce sovereign rights and jurisdiction over all features within the nine-dash line, including the islands, rocks and atolls that make up the Paracel and Spratly Islands. China claims this territory despite a 2016 ruling that found that China’s claims had no basis in international law.

With international law doing little to curb China’s ambitions, more countries are using their militaries to challenge China’s claims. In 2024, more European navies operated in the South China Sea than previously in recent years, with Britain, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands all sending ships to the region. Meanwhile regional counties, such as Japan, Canada, New Zealand and Australia, stepped up their engagement, including via joint sailings with the Philippines in the South China Sea.

Different countries take different approaches to challenging China’s illegal claims in the South China Sea. Some militaries are operating within the nine-dash line. Others sail naval ships directly through the Spratly Islands. Some advertise their activities; others do not.

Only a few have conducted activities close to the Paracels, because doing so is unusually risky. A 2022 incident in which a Chinese pilot dumped chaff in front of an Australian P-8 Poseidon surveillance aircraft is an example of the risk.

The US is the only country to send aircraft or ships within 12 nautical miles of claimed features. By doing so, it would be entering territorial waters if China did in fact own the territory.

These military activities to challenge China’s claims have occurred since 2015:

Country
Military activities in the SCS
Challenges Spratly claims
Challenges Paracel claims
Challenges within 12nm
Publicises challenges
USA

✓

 ✓ ✓ ✓

✓
Canada

✓

 ✓

✓
Australia

✓

 ✓* ✓*

NZ

✓

 ✓*

Japan

✓

 ✓*

UK

✓

 ✓ ✓

✓
France

✓

 ✓ ✓

✓
Germany

✓

Netherlands

✓

Italy

✓

*Challenges are likely but cannot be confirmed

Apart from countries around the South China Sea, which must routinely operate on or over it, the US has by far the most public and active military presence. In 2023, the US military conducted 107 activities, including six specific operations to challenge China’s illegal claims under the US Freedom of Navigation program. US activities are always accompanied by strong public statements.

France and Canada are both active in the region, including within the Spratlys. Both advertise their military presence and actions. Canada now carries journalists on some South China Sea transits. It has operated close to the Paracel Islands, but, as demonstrated when a Chinese fighter fired flares near a Canadian helicopter in 2023, doing so comes with risks. In 2015, France boldly exercised its right to freedom of navigation by sailing a task force through the Paracels.

Australia has an active military presence in the South China Sea. There’s evidence that Australia operates close to China’s illegal claims. However, the tempo and nature of its military challenges are hard to determine, because Canberra does not advertise them. China’s military has been aggressive in seeking to deter Australia from operating near the two island groups by engaging in unsafe intercepts.

New Zealand has a semi-regular presence inside the nine-dash line, commensurate with the size of its armed forces. Meanwhile, Japan has a growing military presence in the region and is increasingly working with partners, such as the US, Australia and the Philippines. As with Australia, there are signs that Japan and New Zealand operate close to, or within, the Spratly group, but neither publicise specific actions, so the nature of them is hard to determine.

Britain sent a carrier strike group through the South China Sea in 2021 and intends to do so again next year. The British military operates close to the Spratly and Paracel Islands and uses public messaging to reinforce the importance of sailing in these areas.

Signalling growing European interest in the region, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy sent navy ships to the area in 2024. But none seems to have overtly challenged China’s claims within the Spratlys or Paracels.

The most notable regional absentee is South Korea. In 2018, a South Korean destroyer, Munmu the Great, took refuge from a typhoon in the Paracel Islands. But Seoul quickly clarified that the ship was not there to challenge China’s claims. Likewise, when the littoral states of South East Asia routinely operate there, they do not directly challenge China’s claims via freedom of navigation transits.

The growing presence of European navies in the South China Sea and stepped-up activity of Asia-Pacific countries there is welcome. It’s helping to push back on China’s growing aggression and reinforce longstanding rules and norms that underpin regional prosperity.

Editors’ picks for 2024: ‘Floating piers and sinking hopes: China’s logistics challenge in invading Taiwan’

Originally published on 27 August 2024.

No doubt the Chinese military was paying attention.

Last month the United States disassembled and removed the floating pier it had assembled at a Gaza beach to take aid deliveries.

Heavy seas beat it. Such a pier supposedly can be assembled in hours, but this one took almost a month. When it was operational, waves damaged it, and it repeatedly had to be pulled away from the beach to prevent its destruction. Once it had to be towed to a port for repairs. Waves drove ashore boats that serviced it.

And all that was nothing compared with the challenges that China’s armed forces would face in trying to deliver a mountain of personnel, equipment and supplies in an invasion of Taiwan. The pier’s lesson for China is that invading the island would be a doomed endeavour.

The weather of the Taiwan Strait makes the eastern Mediterranean look like a bathtub. Defenders would attack China’s piers. Almost every beach where China might want to build floating piers is overlooked by terrain that would turn the unloading zones into kill zones.

Even before those problems arise, building and installing a floating pier is a huge exercise. The US Department of Defense budgeted $230 million for the one at Gaza, called the Trident Pier. It was operational for 20 days—less than half of the time after it was positioned—and handled only about 9000 tonnes of supplies.

Logistics is almost always harder than planned, but joint logistics over the shore (JLOTS)— moving people and things from ships to land without a port—is subject to innumerable kinds of friction.

Any Chinese invasion of Taiwan would require improvised piers in many locations simultaneously. They’d be part of a logistical effort that would be enormously larger than anything the Chinese navy has attempted. Even optimistic estimates of just 300,000 personnel for an invasion force would be double the international forces fighting in Afghanistan at the height of the global war on terror.

Higher estimates suggest an invasion of Taiwan could need as many as 2 million soldiers. Few of them, and very little of their equipment and supplies, could go by air. Almost everything would have to cross the strait in ships.

Taiwan’s seven major ports would almost certainly be contested, guarded by sea drones and subject to sabotage.

The island has 14 beaches usable for military landings. All but one are surrounded by cliffs and urban jungles, perfect places for the Taiwanese army to hide forces that would attack anything coming ashore and anything used in bringing it ashore, including the piers themselves.

Mother Nature would be doing her bit, too. Indeed, her efforts may be enough to prevent using the beaches in the first place.

Also called the Black Ditch, the strait is known for ‘… strong winds, wave swells, and fog…’ half the year. The storms, heavy rain and squally winds of monsoon seasons sweep it and the coasts on either side. An average of six typhoons hit the strait each year. As Ian Easton details in his book The Chinese Invasion Threat, the weather of the strait shrinks the windows available for an invasion to just two months of ‘good suitability’: April and October. That is a narrow time constraint that worsens a vast logistics challenge.

Apart from soldiers and their equipment, the Chinese navy would need to ferry food, fuel and ammunition to them. The landing alone could require 30 million tonnes going ashore, which far outstrips the capacity of the Chinese navy’s amphibious transport fleet.

Recognising this, the navy is incorporating civilian roll-on, roll-off ferries (roros) as reinforcements. While China has fewer than 50 roros today, it could have two or three times as many by 2032.

That still leaves the problem of getting over the beach. China should view the story of the Trident Pier as a cautionary tale. JLOTS operations are technically complex, costly and risky. The security threat to the improvised pier at Gaza was hardly comparable to the one that Taiwan and its friends would present to a Chinese cross-strait amphibious operation. Nor were the weather challenges comparable, though the sea state off Gaza was still bad enough to ensure the US pier was usually not functional.

The money that the US spent on the pier also paid to show China just how hard JLOTS can be. If that lesson deters war, it was a cheap price to pay.

China’s big new combat aircraft: a technical assessment

China’s aircraft industry celebrated Mao Zedong’s birthday in style, unveiling three aircraft developments that will comprise an air warfare family of systems for the 2030s and beyond. One, from Shenyang, looks like a demonstrator for a fighter-size aircraft with next-generation stealth, possibly carrier-compatible. Also new was an airborne warning and control variant of the Xi’an Y-20 airlifter, the latest in an unparalleled air-surveillance line-up.

The most spectacular debutant, making its maiden flight on December 26 was from Chengdu Aircraft Industry Group: a stealth combat aircraft that various anonymous commenters on the Chinese internet identify as the J-36. It is the largest combat aircraft designed and developed in China, and the second-largest to fly anywhere in 35 years.

The J-36 (if that really is its name) is designed to combine supersonic performance with all-aspect stealth. That’s also the goal of the US Next Generation Air Dominance program, currently stalled by budget and policy issues. (A second article in this series looks at the J-36’s roles.)

There may be more. Anonymous Chinese internet commenters with better records for accuracy than others say that the new arrivals are part of an air warfare ‘tea set’ and that we have not yet seen the ‘teapot’—the long-expected H-20 stealth bomber; this will probably be an analogue to the Northrop Grumman B-21. Nonetheless, the J-36 alone has given observers enough to chew on.

Its revelation followed the pattern as the appearance of the J-20 fighter exactly 14 years earlier. No technical details have been released officially, and it’s unlikely that any will be soon, but a prototype for the design flew in daylight from an airfield in a dense urban area, and the Chinese government permitted images to be released.

The aircraft was chased by a two-seat J-20B, giving a good indication of its size. It’s longer than the J-20—about 23 metres—and its double-delta wing spans an estimated 19 metres, with around 200 square metres of wing area. (The F-22’s wing area is 78 square metres.) As I commented on the Global Combat Aircraft Program’s Tempest design, large, moderately swept deltas can accommodate a lot of fuel and are very useful if the designer is looking for long range.

The tandem-wheel main landing gear units point to a big aircraft, since single wheel, tyre and brake units are inadequate at weights above about 35 tonnes. The main weapon bay, about 7.6 metres long, and supplementary side bays for smaller weapons also suggest considerable size. A 55-tonne take-off weight is a reasonable guess, two-thirds more than the J-20 and compared with an estimated 82 tonnes for the Northrop Grumman B-21.

The J-36 planform unequivocally speaks of stealth and supersonic speed. It is a modified version of the Hopeless Diamond, the first shot by Lockheed’s Skunk Works at all-aspect stealth, which got that name because it could not be made to fly with 1970s technology. Another variation on the planform was tried in 2003 with Northrop Grumman’s X-47A Pegasus unmanned combat aircraft demonstrator, which did fly. Once.

On the J-36, the diamond is stretched into a double-delta to reduce transonic and supersonic drag. It has a leading-edge kink, a change in sweep angle. That’s not ideal from the standpoint of radar cross-section but, as Northrop Grumman’s cranked-arrow designs have shown, it can be lived with. There is an unbroken edge and chine line around the aircraft, and all sensor apertures are inside it (not the case with the J-20 and other fighters). That is the foundation of all-aspect stealth.

There are no vertical tail surfaces and no visible control surfaces other than the wing trailing edges, with five moving panels on each side and one behind each engine; such surfaces are called ‘elevons’. (It’s possible that there are flight-control effectors that we have not yet seen, such as inlaid panels in the upper surface of the wing.) The hinge lines of trailing-edge surfaces appear to be covered by flexible skins. The outer pair of surfaces are split horizontally to form brake-rudders, as on the B-2 and B-21, and were fully open in all pictures of the first flight.

Elevons have reliably provided pitch and roll control since the 1950s, but dispensing with the vertical tail is a challenge, and more so with a supersonic aircraft. The J-36 can rely on its brake-rudders when it is not close to an enemy. But, for stealth in a threat zone, it will need to keep them closed and use both aerodynamic and propulsive effects to keep the pointy end in front—which brings us to another almost unique feature.

J-36 has three engines, side-by-side at the rear of the broad centre-body. F-22-like inlets of caret shape, with swept and canted lips, under the wing leading edge, supply the left and right engines, and the center engine is fed by a diverterless supersonic inlet above the body.

The three engine exhausts are ahead of and above the trailing edge, which comprises what appear to be articulating panels. Full turbofan reheat boost would impose scary thermal and acoustic loads on the trailing edge structure. (The trenches at the rear of the Northrop YF-23 into which its engines exhausted did not endure the environment as well as expected.) This tends to support the idea that the J-36’s engines are either non-afterburning or have limited afterburning used for transonic acceleration.

Some commentators have suggested that the J-36 has three engines because China does not have an engine design large enough to power it in a twin installation. This doesn’t seem likely. Even if your available engines were delivering only two-thirds of the thrust required for a production-size twin-engine aeroplane, you could build an 80 percent linear-scale demonstrator with two-thirds the wetted area, and it would be both easier to develop and more representative of the final configuration.

There has to be a good reason to justify the added complexity. One possibility is that the two outer engines provide enough thrust for subsonic flight, while operating at full thrust and peak efficiency, and the third cuts in for supersonic cruise.

A variation on this theme would be to have a center engine optimized for supersonic flight, which would deliver some of the advantages of a variable-cycle engine without its complexity and risk (I can hear the logisticians screaming, 12,000km away) but in a configuration that could be fitted later with a VCE.

One former combat aircraft designer suggests that the trijet arrangement could be influenced by stability and control considerations, allowing for symmetrical thrust vectoring in pitch with one engine inoperative.

The trailing edge flaps would provide thrust vectoring in pitch when used symmetrically and in roll with the outer engines’ exhaust deflected asymmetrically (while still using the center engine for pitch). It is entirely possible that fluidic control (injecting fan-stream air asymmetrically into the nozzle) could be used in the yaw axis.

Three engines in the thrust class of 22,000 lb (10,000kg or 100-kilonewtons) should be enough to make the J-36 a supercruiser—an aircraft that can fly supersonically without using fuel-guzzling afterburning. Its sweep angles point to doing this at Mach 1.8 to Mach 2.0 (1900km/h to 2200km/h, depending on altitude). The key is not so much achieving enough static thrust but building the engine to withstand the high temperatures at the exit of its compressor. China’s engine technology has been headed in this direction.

Agility? High maneuverability is in opposition to combining supersonic cruise and range—the F-22 being deficient in the latter—because it demands large control forces and high installed thrust (and the weight it brings). Physics are a limitation: the J-36’s trailing-edge controls and thrust-vectoring systems must provide all the control force for the aircraft, unassisted by vertical stabilizers, canards or pitch-recovery devices like the Sukhoi Su-57’s movable leading-edge root extensions.

As for the need for maneuverability by a supersonic stealth aircraft packing a heavy weapon load and long-range sensors, the reader is referred to the classic movie short, Bambi Meets Godzilla.

We will learn more about the J-36 as it follows the pattern of the J-20 through a pre-production and service test phase. There are other puzzles about the design: apparently large electro-optical sensor windows on either side of the nose, and a dark-tinted canopy that wouldn’t be road-legal in many US states. But one thing can be said firmly: those who accuse Chengdu chief engineer Yang Wei and other Chinese designers of being copyists need to take a seat.

Baltic subsea sabotage: China gets away with non-cooperation

On Christmas Day, one of two cables connecting Finland’s electricity grid to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania was cut. Four data cables—three linking Finland and Estonia and one between Finland and Germany—were broken at the same time.

This and two earlier instances have heightened concerns about the vulnerability of Europe’s undersea infrastructure, prompting calls for enhanced security measures and international cooperation to safeguard critical communication and energy links.

It’s also a timely reminder to Indo-Pacific countries to think about how their region is similarly vulnerable to subsea sabotage.

Once could be an accident, and twice might be a coincidence. But three instances look like a trend that we shouldn’t ignore or tolerate, especially since we know malign actors like Beijing and Moscow also have the capability to disrupt our critical infrastructure through prepositioned malware.

Finnish authorities are investigating the outage. On 26 December, Finland used heavily armed elite units to board and forcibly detain a tanker, registered in the Cook Islands but in fact Russian, suspecting its crew had deliberately severed the cables. Finnish authorities say the tanker, which was carrying oil, is part of Russia’s effort to avoid international trade sanctions. The ship is also reported to have been equipped for listening to radio transmissions as an intelligence gatherer.

Finnish authorities could board the ship and arrest its crew without the consent of its owner or the country of registration only because it was in Finnish waters. But doing so still required Finland to have the political will to take bold action.

Several data cables and a pipeline connecting Finland and other Nordic countries to the European mainland have been severed in the past year in suspected deliberate anchor-dragging incidents. Jukka Savolainen, a Finnish navy officer and director of the European Center of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats, a body established by NATO and the European Union, has suggested publicly the high number of similar cable breaks shows that the perpetrators are testing whether cheap civilian ships can cause disruptions of critical infrastructure.

The latest Finnish incident follows the simultaneous severing of two undersea data cables in mid-November. The BCS East-West Interlink cable, connecting Gotland to Lithuania, was severed around 17 November, causing substantial disruptions to telecommunications services.

The next day, the C-Lion 1 submarine telecommunications cable, linking Helsinki to Rostock, Germany, was also cut. The damage was detected near the southern tip of Sweden’s Oland Island. The operator, Cinia Oy, said an external force had severed the cable.

Both cables were restored by 28 November. Investigations are ongoing, involving authorities from Sweden, Finland, Lithuania and Germany. A China-flagged ship, Yi Peng 3, which was present near the disruption sites, has been a focus.

On 23 December Swedish authorities said China had denied a request for prosecutors to conduct an investigation on the ship. It left the area soon after. If, as seems very probable, the crew were saboteurs, investigators cannot now hold them accountable. Swedish authorities have criticised China for withholding full access to the vessel.

According to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, China, as the home state of the vessel, is not obliged to give other countries access to it. And only China holds the sole authority to prosecute. The ship was detained in international waters, so Swedish police could only observe the situation; they could not investigate. An accident commission could separately interview the crew and examine the anchor but could not prosecute. Legally, Sweden has limited options beyond seeking economic compensation from the ship’s owner.

Since China has persistently breached the same convention in the South China Sea, its disregard for the interests of other countries in the Yi Peng 3 case comes as no surprise.

The key point is the rest of the world, which does care about such rules, can’t afford to let malign actors continue to get away with it.

Beijing’s refusal to cooperate fully with investigations erodes trust and transparency. These are particularly crucial in incidents involving shared resources, such as undersea cables, which serve as critical infrastructure for multiple nations. A refusal to comply with international investigative norms also encourages other states to act similarly.

China is also ignoring its responsibility to assist in uncovering the truth and ensuring accountability, undermining cooperative norms that underpin a global rules-based order. Under international law, states must prevent and address harm caused by their vessels in foreign or international waters.

Furthermore, disruption of undersea cables not only affects regional communications; it also has significant economic implications and poses risks to broader economic stability. So, China’s non-cooperation exacerbates tensions in Europe and raises concerns about its commitment to preserving the stability of global infrastructure.

Good international citizenship requires states to act in a manner that supports global security. They should be transparent and accountable. China’s refusal to cooperate fully and Russia’s continued effort to break sanctions are at odds with these principles. These incidents show how the Russia-China axis is increasingly working in sync to the peril of the rules-based liberal order. Political will, and unity of purpose, is needed to make clear this is intolerable.

Editors’ picks for 2024: ‘China may be putting the Great Firewall into orbit’

Originally published on 26 August 2024.

The first satellites for China’s ambitious G60 mega-constellation are in orbit in preparation for offering global satellite internet services—and we should worry about how this will help Beijing export its model of digital authoritarianism around the world.

The G60’s inaugural launch on 5 August 2024 carried 18 satellites into low-Earth orbit (LEO) on a Long March 6A rocket. Led by Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technology and backed by the Shanghai Municipal Government, the project aims to compete in the commercial satellite internet market with SpaceX’s Starlink, providing regional coverage by 2025 and global coverage by 2027.

The G60 is one of three mega-constellations that China is planning, alongside the Guowang project, run by state-owned China Satellite Services, and the Honghu-3 constellation, led by Shanghai Lanjian Hongqing Technology Company. These constellations provide the infrastructure to support China’s rapidly growing commercial space sector, including its satellite internet initiatives which are making rapid advances.

China launched the world’s first 6G test satellite into LEO in January. GalaxySpace recently made headlines by deploying satellite internet services in Thailand, the first time Chinese LEO satellite internet had been deployed overseas. In June, the Chinese company OneLinQ launched China’s first civilian domestic satellite internet service, indicating it would expand through countries that had signed up to China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

Yet through these efforts, China is not only securing its position in the satellite internet market but laying the groundwork for expanding its digital governance model far beyond its borders.

Central to China’s ambition is the concept of cyber sovereignty—the notion that each nation has the right to govern its digital domain. In practice, China has used this principle to build a heavily censored surveillance system supporting the Chinese Communist Party’s power, widely condemned for violating human rights.

China’s satellite internet services would enable other governments to adopt similar practices, as the nature of satellite internet makes it susceptible to state control.

Satellite internet is more controllable due to its centralised infrastructure, where data is routed through a limited number of ground stations or gateways. This enables censorship and surveillance as service providers and authorities can more easily monitor, block and filter content.

In contrast, traditional internet infrastructure relies on a decentralised network of sub-sea cables and terrestrial networks managed by many stakeholders with thousands of data exchange points. This decentralised structure makes it difficult for any entity to exert complete control over the flow of information, as countries such as Russia — which initially welcomed the open internet, unlike China or North Korea—have learned.

Countries that use China’s satellite internet service providers could more easily control what information is accessible within their borders, much as the Great Firewall of China operates domestically. This could mean blocking politically sensitive topics, monitoring user activity, or shutting down the internet during unrest. While satellite internet has often been hailed as a means for dissidents and activists to bypass restrictive governments, the reality under China’s model, which would place it in the hands of nation-states, would be starkly different.

China is already exporting its digital authoritarianism through such initiatives as the Digital Silk Road, providing technologies and governance models that enable censorship, surveillance and social control to other countries. These efforts come amid a rise in the global spread of authoritarianism as governments seek to exert control over online spaces. Adopting Chinese satellite internet services would accelerate this trend, empowering other countries to implement similar controls and restrict human rights globally.

Offering satellite internet worldwide has other benefits for Beijing. Countries relying on China’s infrastructure for connectivity may risk being pressured to comply with Beijing’s demands, including censoring content critical of China, sharing sensitive data or suppressing domestic dissent in China’s interests. For example, a journalist in a country that relies on China’s satellite internet services might find his or her connection reduced or severed when reporting human rights abuses in China.

The centralised nature of satellite internet may also make countries more vulnerable to cyber espionage by the Chinese government or malicious actors. Chinese satellite providers may also be subject to China’s stringent data localisation policies, such as the Cybersecurity Law, which requires companies to store data within China and make it accessible to the Chinese government. As China’s satellite projects are intended to provide global coverage, the data of international users—spanning communication, location, and internet activity—would be subject to Chinese data laws. Chinese authorities could potentially access any data transmitted through Chinese satellite internet services.

The global deployment of China’s internet satellite services is still some way off and faces significant challenges. However, if China’s satellite internet services are adopted, the world may witness the rise of a new digital Iron Curtain extending from space, dividing the free flow of information and imposing state control on a global scale.