COVID-19: Even More News on Coronavirus Disinformation Campaigns

Ed. Note: The Foundation for Defense of Democracies Long War Journal and The Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Center both report on China expelling reporters from the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and The Washington Post this week, seen as an attempt by the Chinese Communist Party to control reporting during a time of crisis in China. At the same time, domestic reporting by Chinese state-run media organizations highlights China’s quick response to COVID-19 and testing, a lack of anticipated impact to China’s economy, and other efforts to convey a positive narrative. Chinese officials also are publicly broadcasting that the U.S. military may be to blame for the virus’ movement outside Wuhan and even that the virus may be a product of American biological warfare. While such disinformation and attempts to control foreign media access to China are not unexpected, we should be concerned that the information environment today is such that the public is bombarded with Coronavirus reporting from all over the globe, and is armed with little or no ability to verify and validate the facts.

China’s Dangerous Coronavirus Disinformation Campaign

Thomas Joscelyn

Senior Fellow and Senior Editor of FDD’s Long War Journal

The Chinese government expelled journalists from the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post this week. Beijing claims the move was retaliation against Washington for placing “unwarranted restrictions on Chinese media agencies and personnel in the” U.S. The Trump administration last month required Chinese media organizations to register as “foreign agents,” and China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs argues this “growing discrimination and politically motivated oppression” merited a response. Of course, no one actually thinks America’s three leading newspapers were kicked out of China for this reason. The reality is quite different: Xi Jinping’s minders want to control reporting during a time of crisis. And coronavirus threatens to undermine the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) both at home and abroad.

The CCP now claims that the situation is under control, with new infection rates inside China rapidly falling. This success, Xi’s propagandists argue, demonstrates the superior virtues of China’s authoritarian system. The Chinese government wants the world to believe that it dealt with the crisis in an efficient, even if heavy-handed, manner. There are many reasons to doubt the CCP’s story.

First, there is the way the CCP acted at home early in the crisis. Dr. Li Wenliang tried to warn the world about the virus late last year, but the Chinese security state shut him up. Wenliang died of infection some weeks later in the same Wuhan hospital where he worked. Ren Zhiqiang, a prominent real estate investor, disappeared after penning an essay that was critical of the government’s apparent coverup of the initial outbreak. If Xi’s regime was so confident in its actions, then Zhiqiang’s critique wouldn’t have stirred such a fuss inside the Politburo.

Xi and his team prefer stability, or the illusion of it, at the expense of truth, and this allowed the coronavirus to fester over a crucial period of several weeks. That was the topic of a lengthy Washington Post expose documenting how the Chinese political system was slow to react to the first patients presenting symptoms in mid-December. Another study, prepared by researchers at the University of Southampton in the U.K., credits the Chinese government for eventually limiting the scope of the outbreak. But the authors also concluded that if Xi’s health officials had acted one to three weeks earlier, then the number of infections would have been dramatically fewer—ranging from 66 to 95 percent less than observed. That is a high price for the appearance of security and competency.

Read the rest of the report here.

Expelling U.S. Journalists, China Escalates Political Warfare Over Coronavirus

Dean Cheng
Senior Research Fellow, Asian Studies Center

Dean brings knowledge of China’s military and space capabilities as a research fellow on Chinese political and security affairs.

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the People’s Republic of China has taken the opportunity to further close off the rest of the world’s view of its internal behavior.

Beijing’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a declaration Tuesday that expels journalists from The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. Chinese officials have ordered these reporters to hand in their journalist visas and permits within 10 days.

Those three newspapers, as well as Time magazine and Voice of America, must also provide China with a complete list of their employees, real estate holdings (presumably residences), and financial records.

This is the latest move in an ongoing duel between the United States and China regarding press freedoms.

Read the rest of Dean Cheng’s commentary here.