China and the ‘Three Warfares’

Beijing is increasingly exploiting information operations for influence in areas of strategic competition.

While China’s foreign policy has traditionally relied on economic leverage and “soft power” diplomacy as its primary means of power projection, Beijing has also been actively exploiting concepts associated with strategic information operations as a means to directly influence the process and outcomes in areas of strategic competition.

In 2003, the Central Military Commission (CMC) approved the guiding conceptual umbrella for information operations for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) – the “Three Warfares” (san zhong zhanfa). The concept is based on three mutually reinforcing strategies: (1) the coordinated use of strategic psychological operations; (2) overt and covert media manipulation; and (3) legal warfare designed to manipulate strategies, defense policies, and perceptions of target audiences abroad.

Masters of Psychological Warfare: How the Chinese Are Winning a Secret War

The comprehensive nature of issues discussed during Xi Jinping’s visit once again illuminated the extent of China’s political and social influence in the United States. On October 6, The Heritage Foundation, in cooperation with The Project 2049 Institute, cosponsored the public program event “Influence Operations: Chinese Political Warfare in East Asia and Beyond.”

The event featured a panel of Heritage and Project 2049 policy experts.

But China is our Friend…Right?

 

It was an interesting week last week. For one thing, Chinese company Alibaba debuted as the largest IPO in the history of the world. Larger than the Initial Public Offerings of Facebook, Twitter, Google, Apple, and Microsoft combined. At the same time, there was a Senate report indicating that China hacked U.S. military contractors in a significant way at least twenty times in the past year. In America, we celebrated the success of Wall Street, earning $300 million or so in underwriter fees. In China, they celebrated finding a path to dethrone American technology dominance (from the official Chinese News Agency):

US unsettled by China’s ‘three warfares’ strategy: Pentagon report

The US and its military partners are reaching for new tools to counter an unconventional ”three warfares” strategy that China is using to advance aggressive territorial claims, according to a Pentagon report.

It says the People’s Liberation Army is using what it calls ”legal warfare”, ”media warfare” and ”psychological warfare” to augment its arsenal of military hardware to weaken the resolve of the US and its regional partners to defend islands and oceans in the East and South China seas.