Reviewing China’s Hundred Year Marathon

Michael Pillsbury is a man experienced and knowledgeable in the political sphere. His work has informed Presidents, Generals, and Congressman and determined the strength and scope of their policies. He is one of those men who hide behind the curtain, those whose words send legions of spooks into action. But all indirectly, all hands off, all through analysis. And it’s fitting. He’s got the looks for it.

He’s also the mastermind behind the recent foreign policy hit, “The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower”. In it he scares the bejesus out of American bureaucrats with predictions like “Beijing will push diplomatic demands that seem impracticable or inconceivable today – and other nations will yield to China’s pressure.” And they should be scared, because Pillsbury is right, but wrong and right again.

Pillsbury describes what he calls ‘The Hundred Year Marathon’. The Marathon is, according to the Ying Pao aka China’s Hawk faction, a multigenerational plan to attain global superiority economically with cultural, diplomatic, and military dominance not far behind. China will be the glorious beneficiary of this plan while the United States of America will continue to sink into the background of nations having lost its superpower status. China intends to accomplish this fearsome feat by employing the nine elements of the Marathon, listed below:

1. Induce complacency to avoid alerting your opponent.
2. Manipulate your opponent’s advisers.
3. Be patient – for decades, or longer – to achieve victory.
4. Steal your opponent’s ideas and technology for strategic purposes.
5. Military might is not the critical factor for winning a long-term competition.
6. Recognize that the hegemon will take extreme, even reckless action to retain its dominant position.
7. Never lose sight of shi.
8. Establish and employ metrics for measuring your status relative to other potential challengers.
9. Always be vigilant to avoid being encircled or deceived by others.

Gutsy news and gusty predictions I see. Not only does Pillsbury claim that China, the ever faithful friend and economic ally of America, intends to supplant the USA, he claims that China is using explicitly hostile measures to accomplish it! But is there any proof to those claims, or proof even of motive and desire for such a place? Pillsbury doesn’t wait for covert Sinophiles to derail the discussion and immediately proclaims proof for all these provocative claims. Let’s begin with motive.

For starters Pillsbury claims that the primary desire of the people of China is not the proclamation of freedom, democracy, and human rights, nor the general triumph of liberalism in the world. He claims what the Chinese people crave most, peasant and elite alike, is the uplifting of China as a power in its own right, as the great sovereign of East Asia that it has been so many times before. But this time the Chinese want to expand their hegemony world wide! They want a Chinese world, with a dominant Chinese culture and a dominant Chinese language. They want the 21st century to be theirs.

To call this motive ambitious would be an understatement, but to call it sinister would not. But is it true? Yes and no.

Like Pillsbury I enjoy the study of history. Like Pillsbury I think that the past shows us the solutions to problems of the present. And like Pillsbury I know the history of the Chinese. And I don’t necessarily agree with him. I think his extremely aggressive pro-American perspective blinds him to the subtleties of the Chinese position.

First consider history. China has at least 2500 years of well-recorded history, perhaps much more if current archaeological digs are successful. This has given China a penchant for patience and the long view. Now China has historically been the hegemon of its world. It has lorded over east Asia in ever sense and has enjoyed respect worthy of its hegemonic status. Neighbors didn’t alternate between bouts of power and lack thereof, they alternated between paying tribute and not paying tribute, depending on the strength of their nation and the weakness of the dynasty in power. China has always dominated the picture.

But during this hegemony China has always been extremely measured in its attitudes. Take the Koreans. China has dominated the various Korean kingdoms for hundreds of years, and China has certainly had a powerful cultural influence on the small peninsular country. Sometimes this influence was bullish, at other times it was soft, but it was always there. However, did they try to absorb them into the nation outright? Despite countless opportunities China has not.

Some might say that I misjudge China here, for China is vast and did not get that way by Han colonization alone. China stretches from Urumqi to Lhasa to Guangzhou to Manchuria. How would they attain these lands if not by force? For that again, we must turn our eyes to Chinese history for it will further enlighten us as to the question of Chinese ambitions. Under the Han people China very rarely goes conquering abroad. The Chinese priority has always been unification of the North China plain, the integration of geopolitically necessary locations, and the maintenance of stability. That is all. The bulk of China’s many conquests have been undertaken when China was under the control of a stronger foreign invader. For example, the Mongols expanded China under the Yuan dynasty far beyond the traditional Han or Jin dynasty borders, and the Manchus were responsible almost entirely for the modern China borders.

This is not to say that China isn’t aggressive, that it isn’t ambitious, or that it doesn’t want the 21st century to be a Chinese one. It absolutely does. What it means is that the Chinese don’t look at hegemony the same the West does.

Pillsbury focuses on the Spring and Autumn Annals as a source for Ying Pai inspiration and he’s right to do so. But I don’t think it’s lost on the Ying Pai hawks that the modern day isn’t the era of Warring States. The nature of the game has changed. The Warring States period provides timeless truths as to human nature and political governance to be certain, but it fails to deliver an appropriate mentality for modern dominance. The Chinese have clued into that.

The Chinese see that the only way forward for them is through cooperation. Cooperation given freely, cooperation given fully, cooperation undertaken now. That’s why the Chinese reach out to every nation on the planet and attempt to win them over with money and quaint Chinese culture. It’s not because they want to convert the world in their image. Unlike the Americans, the Chinese know that the whole world does not care to be Chinese. They want to spread out and cooperate because they know that’s the only way for them to survive. They must start offering win-win solutions everywhere.

This recalibrated idea of hegemony is Kryptonite to Pillsbury hypothesis, but only because he overextends himself in thinking that China wants to be the new America. China wants to be the new China, the restored China, but not the new America. Once we correct this by, at the very least, assuming we don’t fully know Chinese intentions we find the work is a veritable treasure trove of Chinese strategic thought.

Consider the first of nine elements in China’s Marathon plan: Induce complacency to avoid alerting the opponent. This is a classic Chinese maxim and is employed near universally, especially in business. The Chinese always seek to manipulate the thoughts and perceptions of their opponents, always. They only risk betting on outright confrontation when they’re sure they can win. This has filled the Chinese people with a kind of guile that extends to every field of their activity. In business they are always attentive not to marketing their own business but of manipulating the perceptions of their competitors. In science their institutions are notoriously opaque. And on the national-strategic scale they are extremely careful to hide their actions, always wishing to be thought of as non-threatening, non-hostile, strictly neutral. The entire Chinese foreign policy of non-intervention is oriented around this maxim.

Again, this is to be expected. The origin of the maxim reaches back into the depths of not only the Warring States period but into every other major period of turmoil and civil war that the Chinese remember. The Qin were always careful to mold alliances to the benefit of other parties while hiding their own goal of total hegemonic dominance. Liu Bei, future Emperor of the Kingdom of Shu Han, was always careful to tip toe around the mighty Prime Minister of the Han Empire, Cao Cao. His greatest fear was that his own ambition be found out and exposed, for he knew that would spell enormous risk at the least and rapid death at the worst. So Liu Bei bided his time, waiting patiently, ultimately overcoming the mighty Cao Cao at the epic Battle of Red Cliff. Shortly afterwards, employing the same principles, he stunned his former ally Wu and seized Jing province in a stunning act of boldness and strategic forethought. Such stories litter Chinese history. It should be no surprise that their foreign policy is full of such attitudes.

The second element of the Marathon plan reflects the spirit of the first. The Chinese have maintained large empires and bureaucracies for thousands of years and know full well that the most powerful players are often the advisers. The advisers advise, they hold influence, and they assist in the practical implementation of almost any plan. China has seen advisers run amok many times, as with the Eunuchs and the tyrant Dong Zhuo, or the usurpers to the Kingdom of Wei in the Sima clan. So they have made enormous investments into encouraging American foreign policy thought in specific directions. The result was 20 years of China naivete where countless professional analysts wrote China off as a simple Panda instead of a cunning Dragon. China continues to manipulate public perceptions across the world by utilizing adviser corrupting institutions such as the Confucius Institute. They come to teach Chinese bringing bags of money with them. And they do not hesitate to use these funds when they deem it in the Chinese interest to silence critics.

This leads us to the third element, the most critical one of them all if China is to overcome American hegemony: The necessity of patience. In the 1970s China was still recovering from successive catastrophes: Famine, military conflict with the Soviet Union, multiple embargoes, the catharsis of its own academic class. And yet China dreamed. It’s conflict with the Soviet Union, which China initiated, was an expression of its ambition. China had always intended to be a key player in world politics. It longed for its former status as the hegemon of East Asia. It could not tolerate its subordinate position to Moscow. So for 25 years it waited patiently in preparation for a turn away from Moscow and towards wherever else it could go, ultimately leading to the American-Chinese alliance under Nixon. The Hundred Year Marathon is simply another expression of this patience as China intends to climb all the way back to the top to what they feel is their natural place in the hierarchy of nations.

Again, this patience should not surprise anyone. Given Chinese culture and history all these qualities seem obvious in hindsight. China has always taken the long view of anything. Their behavior toward the valuation of the Yuan shows extensive foresight, their infrastructure projects, though often failing, show them reaching out into the future. This is the nature of China. Again we could look back to their history for further examples. Consider how the Chinese overcame the Xiongnu, as I described in previous discussions on the Chinese idea of hegemony, Tianxia. China, after being subordinated by the Xiongnu, spent a hundred years slowly reversing the situation until finally the Xiongnu ended up a vassal of the Chinese Emperor. What they Chinese lost in blood they regained by patience. China’s rise in the 20th and 21st century has been considered rapid, but there is still much farther to go. China doesn’t want to merely grow. It wants to grow the best, to be the most advanced, to enjoy the pinnacle of success as has been historically proper to it.

For this reason China employs the fourth element of the strategy, to steal the opponents ideas and technologies and utilize them for strategic success. China under Mao spent 25 years, longer if you count their years resisting the Kuomintang, under the thumb of the Soviet Union. Why? To gain their support for certain, but moreso to gain their technology, their culture, their understanding. The Soviet Union singlehandedly built Communist China in the years after the Nationalist expulsion to Taiwan. Eventually the Soviets caught wind of Chinese intentions and this lead to the dramatic escalations in Xinjiang and Manchuria between the two opposing red armies. After siphoning as much technology and cultural know-how from the Soviets as they could they began to look for a new benefactor, first to secure their position and security and second to learn from in return.

I don’t need to tell anyone how that turned out. Commercially and financially China is a phenomenally powerful country, second only to the USA and to the city of London on the financial front. They have learned the American lessons expertly, relying on the World Bank and the IMF to give them useful financial advice. The modern Chinese strategy of manipulating the Yuan and using state-owned enterprises in virtually every sensitive market area? A Western strategy, coming directly from the Western financial elite. They handed it to them on a platter with a note: If you want to beat America economically, follow this formula. Central to this formula was the importation of manufacturing from America especially into China under favorable terms. Why? Because it was the most effective way to gain access to decades of costly research for minimal cost.

Notice that countless Chinese manufacturing areas aren’t turning a profit. The state uses subsidies and runs its state owned enterprises (SOEs) at a financial loss. They do this to crush foreign manufacturing competition and to bring home massive amounts of foreign-developed technology. And the program has been a fascinating success. Consider that Iphones, some of the most advanced commercial electronics in the world, are constructed in China and not America. Its not because of labor. Its because China will do whatever it takes to bring these advanced technology companies to the country where they can pilfer the technology at will. Remember also that China has virtually no intellectual property or patent law enforcement. The market is a free for all! And that’s how the Chinese like it at this stage, the growing stage. All the while China engages in extensive industrial and economic espionage as well. There is a not-so-secret cyber war going on between Chinese and American hackers as the Chinese try to probe American systems and, where able, extract sensitive information. For example the Joint Strike Fighter program, aka the F-35 Lightning, has had its data pilfered multiple times. And that’s America’s most expensive military R&D program to date.

Notice that nowhere have I mentioned the prioritization of military force. While the nuclear age makes conventional superiority somewhat redundant the Chinese disincentive that kind of violence even more. They know that they could not engage the military of America and be victorious and worse, the declaration of open hostility between the Americans and the Chinese would constitute the immediate encirclement of China and a blockade by sea, the great Chinese strategic nightmare. Peace is a requirement for them. This does not mean military preparations are not important to the Chinese, for they are. Only that they are not the priority or the critical factor in the outcome of this drawn-out battle.

On the military front the Chinese have been keen to develop a number of mobile weapon systems to counter America superiority. The Chinese military perspective is, in one sense, similar to the Russian one: Build maximally low cost counter-weapons to high cost enemy armament. An expression of this could be seen in the Serbian Army’s counter to the American bombing campaign: They would build tank, artillery, and anti-aircraft shells out of wood, then stick tractor and truck engines in them. The total cost would be a few hundred dollars. The Americans would come in with their fancy fighters and their fancy weapons and drop $300,000 guided bombs on the targets. The result was a small mobile force financially bleeding the worlds most powerful airforce, and this contributed to the American move to target almost strictly civilian, commercial, and industrial infrastructure. The Chinese are engaged in the same game, except their targets are much larger. The Chinese have designed what they call ‘Assassin’s Mace’ weapons. And Assassin’s Mace is an extremely low cost weapon that acts as a force multiplier against something more powerful and expensive. For example the Chinese designed a great American naval fear, the anti-carrier missile. Each missile costs a few million dollars but should a single one strike an American aircraft carrier the Americans will lose a ship worth billions upon billions and which is not readily replaceable. Another such tool is the anti-satellite missile, which the Chinese notoriously tested last decade against their own satellite. Both of these weapons are low cost relative to the targets they destroy and both are mobile and can be utilized by roadside launchers. This makes them almost impossible to find. Clearly they are no strangers to military innovation.

While the Chinese have developed these fearsome, specifically anti-American military technologies they are under no illusions that using them is a good idea. Chinese history teaches time and time and again that a hegemon will go to drastic, desperate lengths to preserve its position at the top of the hierarchy. And in a nuclear age no one can afford desperate action, especially desperation in the USA. This desperation is becoming increasingly obvious today as the USA makes riskier interventions every year on increasingly flimsy justifications while suffering increasing amounts of societal destabilization. Asabiyyah has been eroded internally and intentionally, so the American state responds with kicking its hegemonic role into overdrive. How else would the USA find itself in both Georgia and the Ukraine, both clear Russian areas of interest? How else would it find itself virtually funding the Umbrella Revolution in Hong Kong when such a measure will obviously put the Chinese on edge and invoke a response? The Americans are clearly desperate to maintain their power, so all competitors must dance nimbly around them or risky catastrophic nuclear annihilation. And not just of themselves; of the whole world. So we have come to the place the Chinese fear most.

Finally we reach the final three elements: Awareness of Shi, the use of metrics maximally, and the avoiding of encirclement and deception. All relate to one another in a curious way. First is the concept of Shi which is critical yet unspoken of in the West. Shi is the political current so to speak, the current trend, the rising and falling of forces. I suspect it has a lot to do with the structure of the Chinese language, the idea of Qi or energy and the constant flow of information this way. The concept is excellent and has incredible amounts of utility. However Shi can be modified; All actions by all players affect it to varying degree. It is like each actor is walking in a very shallow, very sensitive creek. The movement of various actors will affect the flow of the water as it continues downstream. This is why metrics are so important. Every possible metric needs to be recorded, quantified and review. Maximal knowledge will reveal the maximal number of opportunities to influence Shi in the favor of one’s own party.  The Americans, for example, are experts at manipulating Shi via their propaganda and information warfare. They can create rebellion from almost nothing and rapidly turn small scale protests into full on riots. Always though Shi remains a somewhat impersonal force, open to influence but never control. The American failing is their constant seeking of control, which is doomed to failure.

This brings us to the final element, the need to avoid encirclement and deception. This is the traditional America weakness. The Americans all too often see what they want to see. Their foreign policy is best described as ‘You create your own reality’. Take the Ukraine. The Americans figure if they say enough times that Russia is fighting it will be the truth, or at least everyone will believe it. This approach leads to them getting deceived repeatedly as we saw in Debaltsevo, as we saw with Putin’s rise, as we see with continued Syrian survival, and as we see with countless other small events that fail to go the way of the Americans.

In contrast the Chinese fear this most of all, for wishful thinking leads to being deceived, and to be deceived leads to encirclement, and encirclement leads to catastrophic loss. This contributes to their love and devotion to metrics. Everything needs to be measured as accurately as possible; for if we do not measure it how do we know we aren’t being deceived? Only by avoiding deception and encirclement and outlasting the Hegemon as it makes increasingly foolish moves can the Marathon be completed successfully.

Having touched and explained each of the elements I want to move towards the American response. Pillsbury insists that America is unaware of all these Chinese ploys, of the games they play, and the Chinese suspicion of America’s counter encircling strategies constitutes projection. I think the exact opposite. In fact I suspect that Pillsbury is using the same deceptive counter-tactics to implore his audience to action and strengthen his rhetoric. After all if America really is altruistic in its policies towards China then China has utterly betrayed it, and actions according to Pillsbury’s prescription are necessary right away!

But of course this is silly. America is the hegemon of the world. It did not become hegemon by being altruistic, and Pillsbury must know he is presenting an intentionally false picture of the American worldview. He does this several times throughout the book, applying a kind of generosity to the American state that it simply doesn’t have. The Americans cultivate the illusion of generosity, of virtue, of freedom and kindness and all the good things in life. But in practice their state practices the opposite, leaving only chaos and destruction and suffering and pain in its wake. But always it does this in a specific fashion, in an orderly fashion, with intention and care.

Consider the Chinese fear of encirclement. Pillsbury laments that no measures are being undertaken to halt it, but this is a barefaced lie on his part. The Americans are presently attempting the ultimate encirclement gesture via the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement that specifically excludes China while uniting East and South-East Asia with North America in a vast common market that explicitly favors American economic domination. In the modern world strict military alliances are not needed. Economic extra-constitutional agreements like this signify alliance in all but name. Were this agreement ratified it would lock East Asia into the American sphere and cripple China which needs their growing economics to grow its own. A similar move is being played to encircle Russia with the Trans-Atlantic partnership. And of course America is masterful in its use of Shi, constantly creating or manipulating circumstances to suit larger geopolitical needs. Nobody does it better than the Americans.

We must also consider the Ying Pais themselves, the faction that most heavily follows and supports the elements of the marathon. Their strength derives direct from the over imperialism of the Hegemon, of America. When America is quiet Ying Pai strength diminishes. When America is loud and aggressive, as it is now, Ying Pai influence explodes and China changes course accordingly. A pacifistic American regime could easily instigate major reform in China by simply backing off, making the Ying Pai and their hawkish rhetoric seem foolish. But obviously America will never do that, although Pillsbury portrays exactly those qualities in America.

Clearly Pillsbury’s notion of the innocent America reeks to high heaven of the same Chinese deceit and manipulation that he deplores in his book. Of course it is natural to use it, it is the way for those who receive that excellent education into the nature of political method and life. And that’s what the this book is: A glimpse into the Chinese political paradigm, and a largely accurate one at that. That Pillsbury uses the very techniques he laments is testimony to that.

I will say this: China definitely has a Hundred Year Marathon, but the outcome of the Marathon will be decided within the next 5 years. It is our collective curse and blessing to live in such exciting times!

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