China employs various “gray zone” tactics—moderately aggressive actions that are not egregious enough to provoke conventional military retaliation—against multiple adversaries. One such tactic is deployed within the United States: undeclared influence operations through social media. Chinese government-linked activity has recently become more worrisome. Previously, the principal danger was PRC propaganda lulling the U.S. into uncritical acceptance of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) foreign policy agenda. Now, the Chinese government is adding its weight to the forces tearing at America’s national fabric from the inside.
Until recently, the main thrust of PRC-sponsored messaging aimed at Americans through social media was to cultivate a positive image of China and its current government and promote Beijing’s point of view on controversies, such as Taiwan’s political relationship with China, the treatment of Uyghurs and Tibetans, and the restriction of civil liberties in Hong Kong. The content of social media posts was similar to what Chinese diplomats based in the United States were saying when they gave public speeches and TV interviews or wrote editorials for newspapers.
This contrasted with the messaging promoted by the Russian government, which generally disparaged the U.S. government and amplified highly divisive social and political issues, suggesting the Russian goal was to foment political instability in America. This seemed consistent with the respective Russian and Chinese relationships with the United States. Putin wanted to hurt the United States. He held deep grudges over the loss of Russia’s great power status in the 1990s, humiliating U.S. treatment of Russia through the expansion of NATO, the disregard for Russian sensibilities as America waged conflicts in Iraq, Libya, and Syria; the publication in 2016 of the so-called Panama Papers (which Putin said was an attempt by the U.S. government to embarrass him), and U.S. sanctions against Russia for its annexation of Crimea in 2014. Putin would likely welcome America falling into anarchy and economic collapse. China, on the other hand, needed Americans to continue buying Chinese goods, educating Chinese students, and transferring cutting-edge technology to China. Hence, the goal of Chinese strategic messaging was to defeat any threats to business as usual with the United States.
The attempt to foster positive U.S. attitudes toward China has continued. During the 2022 election campaign in the United States, PRC-linked entities promulgated messaging supportive of China-friendly candidates in a few electoral races. TikTok has promoted short videos to millions of its users that support the PRC propaganda line about Xinjiang (namely, that it’s a happy place where Uighurs spontaneously dance rather than languish in detention camps).
But now, there is an even darker aspect of PRC messaging.
The U.S. Director of National Intelligence notes “growing [PRC] efforts to actively exploit perceived U.S. societal divisions,” by which “The PRC aims to sow doubts about U.S. leadership [and] undermine democracy.”
According to Clint Watts, general manager of Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center, “More recently, [PRC government] efforts have shifted to exploiting existing partisan divides in the U.S.,” including “the Chinese actually going into U.S. audience spaces, masquerading as Americans, and posting inflammatory content around current events or social issues or political issues.”
