Chinese propaganda is just so... Tone deaf. Give me a couple million dollars and a couple interns and I'm pretty sure I could do better than any of its existing organs. This isn't a particularly high bar: you could probably do better just by doing nothing.
Increasingly, this pressure is happening in college campuses as well (not just in America)<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/29/world/australia/drew-pavlou-china-university-queensland.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/29/world/australia/drew-pavl...</a><p><a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/china-on-campus-doj-battled-nontraditional-espionage" rel="nofollow">https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/china-on-campus-doj-...</a><p><a href="https://thefederalist.com/2020/08/25/american-universities-are-now-the-front-line-of-the-china-u-s-cold-war/" rel="nofollow">https://thefederalist.com/2020/08/25/american-universities-a...</a>
To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.<p>– Sun Tzu, Art of War
~50M of PRC "FARA" influence are likely legal media campaigns - full page ads, sponsored editorials etc. This likely doesn't include social media influence campaigns run out of PRC proper like building up twitter presence over last couple years.<p>IMO Long over due and prudent asymmetric investment. PRC can't compete against US media/propaganda, but relatively easier to target divisive US polity as Russians pioneered. Reverse not so true, PRC GFW and crippling of western NGOs has dramatically limited western influence.<p>Also keep in mind US just passed bill to spend 300M annually on Countering Chinese Influence Fund, with addition 100M annually on USAGM / Radio Free Asia. Layer on FLG Media / Bannon & Guo and PRC has a long way to go.
Anyone else noticing the YouTube showing a lot more Chinese propaganda videos? I find it funny, because are so bad.<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/c/ChinaViewTV" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/c/ChinaViewTV</a>
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/c/cgtn" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/c/cgtn</a>
The title is incredibly misleading. Previously, China State Run Media companies weren't required to register under FARA, new laws mean they have to. The amount of spending is the same, but the category is different. 50M of the 64M alone come purely from CCTV America.
I wonder how many of the "...but Chinese propaganda doesn't work" are writing their posts on a Chinese-made phone or computer and adroitly not thinking of why every piece of electronics they make is made in China.
It seems to me that all a foreign power has to do has to generate enough twitter/fake news saying "OMG we are running out of toilet paper/gas", and watch America crumble.<p>It is like the covid virus is not the one doing the damage; it is the immune system's own response, the cytokine storm.
Given the topic, some of you may be interested in the China Owns US [1] website.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.chinaownsus.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.chinaownsus.com/</a>
FARA registrations does not necessarily equate with trying to influence Americans per se. The mainly Chinese news agencies and all their US employees are registered under FARA. The consumption of their news is probably primarily consumers in China and China-watchers. My guess is their main desire is to influence the Chinese populace only.<p>During the cold war all Kremlinolgists would read Pravda to figure out the truth (pun definitely intended for the multilinguals). I doubt any Americans that read it were ever swayed by their coverage of blacks and civil rights. When atrocities against say blacks were highlighted, or bombing countries like Laos or Vietnam, the ensuing inevitable recriminations would always be on charges of whataboutism or disinformation.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kremlinology" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kremlinology</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pravda" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pravda</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laotian_Civil_War" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laotian_Civil_War</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disinformation" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disinformation</a><p>“A Lie Can Travel Halfway Around the World While the Truth Is Putting On Its Shoes” - which ironically is misattributed to Mark Twain
Aside from their hard work & valuing education, how did China rise up in modern times to get all of this social, economic, & technological power? Recent history has some interesting twists & they have had many helping hands.
"from just over $10 million in 2016 to nearly $64 million last year"<p>Top sources:<p>CCTV America $50,244,312<p>Huawei Technologies $3,495,775<p>China Daily of Beijing, China $3,004,114<p>China-US Exchange Foundation $928,209<p>Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Co $526,925<p>[1] <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/fara/countries/223?cycle=" rel="nofollow">https://www.opensecrets.org/fara/countries/223?cycle=</a>
At the risk of being accused of whataboutism, I raise you the $300 million "Countering Chinese Influence Fund"<p><a href="https://www.axios.com/senate-china-bill-474f96f1-467b-4c02-ab6e-1084ca73b158.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.axios.com/senate-china-bill-474f96f1-467b-4c02-a...</a>
I’ve noticed a huge amount of “I have an agenda” comments on youtube videos related to Chinese news. Check anything posted by smcp, especially anything on HK.
Not sure how anyone is surprised by this.<p>It's been proven that Russian influence peddling is well funded and active, even if its effect is hotly debated since Republicans pretend its negligible, while Democrats act like it's the only reason Trump won 2016.<p>It was just a matter of time before other foreign actors saw what's possible and decided it's a better use of their funds to influence American politics rather than expensive arms races or insurgencies.<p>Why spend a few billion on nuclear programs and arming militias when you can instead spend a few million on troll farms and push your agenda forward more effectively?
> Between the lines: Like those of other nations, Chinese state-run media have resisted U.S. Justice Department demands to register under FARA, a law originally created to expose Nazi propaganda in the U.S. Prior to their disclosures, these Chinese media organs operated in the shadows, unencumbered by FARA requirements requiring disclosure about their structures and finances.<p>So it's not that they've increased their spending. It's that their existing spending has now been correctly categorized.
Well it appears to be working, so they'd be foolish to not invest more.<p>We've currently got a major political divide over whether a pandemic was something to take seriously, expressed as a rejection of a common sense mitigation for respiratory virii. The "stop the steal" big lie is continuing ("AZ voter database has been erased"), with the Republican leadership continuing to fall in line behind dear leader.<p>FOX news was apparently not fake enough, so now we've got Newsmax and OAN. I even just got an unsolicited fake newspaper in the mail, which starts off with "Ninety percent of news outlets in the US are controlled by just six corporations", but then launches right into the bog standard red team myopic tropes.<p>Take a look at the recent gasoline shortages caused by the media itself spreading fear that there won't be enough. It's an increasingly postmodern world, where the media itself is creating reality. Of course every foreign country wants to buy into that!<p>Just for reference here, I'm a libertarian, not some Democratic partisan. I'm very concerned with mass media being pwnt by big business, but at least they represent the stabilizing interests of the US establishment rather than whomever is tearing us apart. The enemy of my enemy is not inherently my friend.<p>I don't have any simple answer that squares with our society's recognition of the natural right of free speech, but we are indeed staring down a very serious problem.
They prob fund the race-baiting that separates American society by boundaries that pale in comparison to boundaries of economic status. Middle class people of all races have much more in common with each other in America, than compared to people of the same race but different economic statuses.<p>CCP wants to tear us apart, make our youth stupid, create plausible deniability during quick conflicts (like a blitzkrieg of Taiwan).