As I’m sure I’ve made well aware, I’ve been working on a masters degree in cybersecurity with a focus in terrorism. Currently, the class that I’m working on is centered around the focus - “Topics in Intelligence”. This class is built around understanding the law as it pertains to the intelligence community as well as how to begin applying analytical skills to the intelligence that we gather or review. Chiefly, we focus on OSINT, or open source intelligence for the uninitiated. In an effort to continue posting more on here, I wanted to share a bit of a post that I had put together for the class a week ago. Since the situation in China has been changing rapidly, much of this news will be out of date already although it still helps provide a level view of China and Chinese affairs at a time when worries are overflowing and unfettered racism towards the Chinese seems to be reasonable in the main stream and social media. Without further adieu, here’s the post… —

It’s impossible to touch on China in any capacity without tying together the two most significant overarching stories impacting the nation and the rest of the world as a result. The first is the arrival of Lunar New Year as of the 25th of the month. The Chinese New Year is one of the largest festive periods for Chinese, culturally understood as a period for businesses to shutdown and allow all workers to travel home in order to visit their families. Early estimates of the migrations that would occur were around three billion trips taken by the Chinese (Bloomberg News, 2020). The “Year of the Rat”, the Chinese Zodiac sign, is supposed to be a joyous time across the country as well as for the diaspora of Chinese that live across the world. The other prominent news story has overshadowed much of the week’s positivity with deep concern, leading to desperation and confusion across the world and especially throughout the region. This is, of course, the coronavirus that has, as of the time of this writing, been diagnosed 2,000 times. The diagnoses are primarily in China although cases have been found in the U.S. as well as France, Australia, Japan South Korea among others (Tierney et al., 2020).

Amidst the overwhelming amount of travel that was preparing to be underway, Wuhan, a city five times the size of London and is often compared to Chicago for its significance and inland location, was initially locked down to limit the spread of the virus although the lockdown has since spread to other cities throughout the Hebei province while travelers are having their temperature checked as they navigate throughout other provinces and cities (Al Jazeera, 2020). The virus is drawing comparisons to SARS which had a global outbreak starting similarly from open air markets. In the aftermath of SARS, the public is receptive to rumors about the Chinese government stifling figures about the scope of the outbreak although seemingly, the government is working with the World Health Organization, the Center for Disease Control and other global researchers to expedite the research and work on a vaccine. For the first time, collaboration in research on a disease is occurring at such an impressive scale resulting in the findings from NIH being confirmed by the isolation of the virus performed by a group of Chinese researchers (Johnson, 2020).

Most news is understandably related to the coronavirus with its wide-ranging impact. Related to terrorism, Uighur re-education camps in Xinjiang, alleged to have been created to curb terrorism and extremism in the far west of China, have seen the first case of the coronavirus. Considering the terrifying reports of sanitary conditions in these camps, the risk of the disease tearing through such a vast and defenseless population while they’re in the custody of the government is a very real issue to keep a watch on over coming weeks (Bostock, 2020). The economy has seen certain changes with Chinese markets reaching their lowest point since the start of the year reutersChinaStocksSink2020. Hearkening back to the SARS outbreak once again, speculation is that the markets will temporarily dip but quickly bounce back after the disease has been contained (Domm, 2020).

While there is no current news pertaining to war, there is the potential for an escalation of tensions between the United States and the People’s Republic of China over the extradition hearing that has recently begun for Huawei’s CFO, Meng Wanzhou. The CFO was picked up at the request of the United States during a visit in Canada over suspicions of Huawei’s dealings with Iran in violation of the United States’s economic sanctions. Curiously, the extradition hearing has brought about some protesters that, when interviewed, had stated they believed they were extras in a film and were being paid 150CAD for their time (Larsen, 2020).

Citations:

Al Jazeera. (2020, January 25). China expands coronavirus outbreak lockdown to 56 million people. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/01/china-expands-coronavirus-outbreak-lockdown-fast-tracks-hospital-200124201635848.html

Bloomberg News. (2020, January 20). China Will Rack Up Three Billion Trips During World’s Biggest Human Migration. Bloomberg.Com. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-20/china-readies-for-world-s-biggest-human-migration-quicktake

Bostock, B. (2020, January 24). The Wuhan coronavirus has hit Xinjiang, where China has imprisoned at least 1 million Uighur Muslims. Its filthy detention camps will make inmates sitting ducks. Business Insider. https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-xinjiang-uighur-squalid-detention-camps-2020-1

Domm, P. (2020, January 23). History shows China’s coronavirus impact on markets likely to be short-lived. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/23/chinas-coronavirus-will-be-a-negative-for-some-markets-until-it-stops.html

Johnson, C. Y. (2020, January 24). Scientists are unraveling the Chinese coronavirus with unprecedented speed and openness. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2020/01/24/scientists-are-unraveling-chinese-coronavirus-with-unprecedented-speed-openness/

Larsen, K. (2020, January 22). The strange tale of the paid protesters supporting Meng Wanzhou at her extradition hearing. CBC News. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/paid-protesters-meng-wanzhou-1.5434613

Tierney, L., Meko, T., & Fox, J. (2020, January 26). Mapping the spread of the new coronavirus. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/01/22/mapping-spread-new-coronavirus/