China’s “Discourse Power”

Sarah and Steve are joined by Thomas Joscelyn, who writes the Vital Interests newsletter for ...

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Sarah and Steve are joined by Thomas Joscelyn, who writes the Vital Interests newsletter for The Dispatch, to discuss the diplomatic battle between the U.S. and China, Afghanistan exit deal, and how a Biden administration might change our foreign policy.


Show Notes:

–Tom’s newsletter Vital Interests

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  1. Avatar photo
    Lawrence Jones

    Wow, Tom is a great asset to The Dispatch. More please! Thanks Tom

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  2. Lori Meldrum

    Thomas - I think you said "gambit". I believe the word is "gamut". Hearing a lot of that these days.

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  3. WBS

    I'm an enormous fan of Thomas and the Long War Journal. They're a great resource.

    That being said, I would strongly urge those interested in Afghanistan to give other sources a read too. Specifically, the Afghan Analyst Network and a great book, "An Enemy We Created: the Myth of the Taliban and Al Qaeda Merger." There are other notable Afghan watchers that push back on the LWJ.

    I recommend other sources as an active duty service member who has spent three years in Afghanistan at the village, provincial, and national levels. I also speak Dari/Pashto.

    There's no doubt that there are significant problems with "the Taliban Peace Deal." However, I would strongly push back on the idea that the Taliban is the longest or strongest ally of Al Qaeda. It's important to remember that Al Qaeda was already in Afghanistan when the Taliban finally took Kabul--and that Mullah Omar kept UBL at an arm's length and was unaware of the 9-11 attacks. Further, large swaths of senior-level Taliban leaders tried to reconcile with the Afghan government after we invaded. What did we do? We spurred their request and went HVI hunting.

    What's Thomas' recommendation in Afghanistan? What should we do? We've created an Afghan National Security apparatus in our image that is incapable of funding itself. Its logical supply system is hopelessly corrupt. I've read ideas like holding Pakistan accountable for decades--and yet three successive administrations have never been able to do. Why? Because our logistical supply chains run through Pakistan to feed our troops in Afghanistan.

    Let's also look at the Afghan government: Abdullah and Ghani remain locked in a battle over the presidency nearly 6 months after the election. This is occurring while COVID-19 spreads throughout Kabul. While Ghani has made some necessary changes/reforms, the Afghan government is weaker today than ever before. Its control of the countryside is severely challenged.

    Lastly, the most important thing we can do is continue funding the Afghan government. There's an idea that if we simply withdraw then the Afghan government will simply disintegrate. However, President Najibullah held the mujahideen at bay for years -- defeated UBL and his cohorts at the Battle of Jalalabad -- with USSR funding. The million-dollar question is can we do that without troops in Afghanistan. I would hope so, but that's not a certainty.

    The Taliban does not equal Al Qaeda. It has been overwhelmingly interested in Afghanistan and not transnational terrorism. And while Serajuddin Haqqani has stronger ties to AQ than other portions of the neo-Taliban insurgency, he's been more of a "fountainhead of jihad" in Khost, Paktia, and Paktika than anything else.

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    Octávio Lima

    Mr. Joscelyn is certainly correct there is no consistent view of what foreign policy should be. It is also correct to say that we are ceding space to bad actors and making foreign policy incoherent. But there are some things that we must assume and that I believe Mr. Joscelyn is wrong. China is not as strong as people make it to be. A strong country is not as concerned about its own population as China is. A strong country does not need to repress freedom instincts as much as China does. The evidence is also against the current prevailing thinking that economic freedom did very little to change China. As we have seen towards the end of the Hu Jintao years, China has started to repress freedom instincts that were arising. It expressed itself in many ways, protests by students, protests against pollution in big cities, protests against forced relocation within the country, both from the countryside and within cities, the fast and dramatic spread of religion in the country. All of those were signs of economic freedom bringing other freedoms to the country, a sense of property rights, an inherent desire for a stable rule of law. It is true and fair to say these things did not cause the communist party to reform or even embrace those freedoms, quite the opposite, but that is not to say none of that happened. Every time I read or listen to a pundit say that economic liberalization did not change things in China, I am a bit puzzled as to why the evidence to the contrary is always ignored. And that evidence escapes a regime that controls the information tightly. As for the Trump administration approach to China, to say they have been tougher on the country is not correct. The desires of the administration with respect to the country are clear. They do not worry about the great power competition Mr. Joscelyn mentions. They are worried about economics only. The President is clear his worry is the trade deficit, not the repression of China. He is worried about manufacturing in the US, not China's desire to have satellite nations for the regime in Africa and Latin America. He is worried about seeling American goods in China, not containing its bad influences in authoritarian places. The point about diversification of supply chains should bring back debates about TPP and TTIP, as well as the expansion of trade worldwide. But we do not see that, quite the opposite. I hope we consider these things moving forward.

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  5. Nathan Shiba

    Incredibly interesting. With all that's swirling around and our focus on COVID-19, it's very useful to hear the perspective of someone with an outward focus on Afghanistan. We can certainly cut and run now, but there will be consequences.

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    BWG

    I read and enjoy Thomas Jocelyn's Vital Interests column, and can highly recommend this podcast in which he ranges over a number of national security topics in greater depth. I agree with one of the other commenters that these are really important matters to be discussing.

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  7. PM

    One would hope that the Senate will do more than just rubber stamp the Afghanistan exit deal.

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  8. Kmsinatra

    I really enjoyed this episode. I used to do a lot of work on China and I appreciate the intelligent discourse. Regarding Jihadis and cats, I wonder if Mr Jocelyn is familiar with Samir Khan's (formerly AQAP) cat, Smuckers

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    Dick Scuttlebutt

    Mr. Joscelyn, or anyone else, can you provide more examples of Chinese (or other nations') movies where the Bad Guy is an American or the US government? Not old Soviet propaganda stuff, I'm more interested in recent productions as other nations experiment with cultural propaganda. The concept fascinates me. I found a semi-recent Turkish movie called Valley of the Wolves which I can't find streaming anywhere, but other than that, I can't find any.

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  10. Benjamin Jensen

    Thomas needs more airtime on The Dispatch podcast circuit.

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    1. Mike M

      yes, I would love for him to have a dispatch podcast to call his own.

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      James Spiller

      I agree with this. There’s a lot going on in the world and the media space is being super navel oriented.

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        BWG

        The media just reports what sells. The issue is that the US public is inwardly focused compared to that of most other countries. Those other countries have had to deal with powerful neighbors, or at least neighbors who are comparably powerful. This US isolation has an upside and downside. We've had to worry very little about foreign aggression/invasion, but as a result we don't get engaged until very late. Think Pearl Harbor, 9/11/01, and finally addressing China's quest for dominance long, long after we should have, to name just three big ones that span the past 85 yr. I certainly won't say that we never think outside our own borders, but I will say that a greater outward awareness by the US public would benefit our national interest. Leaders would have to respond by engaging more internationally, and I think that would reduce the severity of the international crises we face. I agree with President Washington that we should avoid foreign entanglements, but that doesn't mean we're not engaged. *** On re-reading this before posting, it occurs to me that it's incumbent on our national leadership to credibly articulate to the US public why we should care about international affairs. That is generally not done unless it serves their immediate domestic agenda. They need to articulate why it matters for the long game.

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