Why national security law will not be the death of Hong Kong, just as the handover wasn’t. By David Dodwell

• Fears were widespread in 1997 that handover would mean the end of Hong Kong’s freedoms but this didn’t happen because the capitalist city was valuable to China
• Given this is still the case today, Beijing must not ignore international alarm over the new law and apply it narrowly.

• On the historic night of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong from British to Chinese sovereignty, a grave and breathless correspondent from a leading US television network stood with his back to a highway as armoured PLA trucks trundled past.

  The gist of his commentary was clear: as thousands of troops from the People’s Liberation Army tonight pour across the border into Hong Kong, we mark the solemn end of freedom in this tiny territory. It was a narrative launched by Fortune’s “The Death of Hong Kong” cover story in July 1995, and it continues today.

  What these reports did not record is that once the PLA troops had trundled nocturnally into their barracks, vacated just hours earlier by British troops, they were almost never seen again. That remains as true today as ever. The muscular exertion of national power predicted by so many commentators never happened.

  Forecasts of extensive interference also failed to materialise. Hong Kong people were – as promised – left to rule Hong Kong.

  Relentless encroachment on Hong Kong’s “high degree of autonomy” did not occur. Hong Kong’s internationally trusted common law legal system continued to operate, overseen by judges drawn from common law jurisdictions across the world. Freedom of speech expressed through Hong Kong’s infamously cantankerous media continued unabated.

  

  Then American Chamber of Commerce chairman Steve Marcopoto holds up a copy of the July 1997 Fortune magazine edition with the cover “The Death of Hong Kong” during a lunch in Pacific Place on January 18, 2006. By then, many of the worst predictions for Hong Kong had failed to materialise. Photo: David Wong

  Without question, this all stuck in the craw of leaders in Beijing. But it was tolerated for a simple set of reasons: unlike the outgoing colonial administration which regarded Hong Kong as a distant and insignificant liability, Beijing really needed Hong Kong and the indispensable role it played linking the mainland economy with a large, complex global economy.

  If a “high level of autonomy” was the price to be paid for access to global capital markets, and to a rich pool of legal, accounting and financial expertise that could familiarise China’s new generation of technocrats with the ways of the capitalist world and its institutions, then so be it.

• That Faustian compromise remains as pivotal today as it was in 1997, and calls into question the Armageddon alarms that this week greeted the release of a 

  national security law

   for Hong Kong.

  For Beijing, “one country, two systems” sanctions radically different systems and behaviours within Hong Kong, giving the mainland economy access to and insights into the global economy it fervently wants to be a member of, but without forcing systemic changes within China itself that would be disruptive and divisive.

  What you should know about China's new national security law for Hong Kong

  That is why, when mainland officials say today that they remain committed to the “one country, two systems” autonomies embedded in Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, they really mean it.

  Not out of any sentimental sympathy for our freedoms, which for sure regularly test their patience, but because they really need Hong Kong to be different, and for sceptical outsiders to recognise that difference.

• Put these factors together, and that is why Fortune and the innumerable other doomsayers about Hong Kong were wrong in 1997, and probably remain just as wrong today, about the death of Hong Kong and Beijing’s behaviour here.

  In an angry editorial on Thursday, the Financial Times scoffed at Hong Kong’s business leaders who “are eager to believe that the [security] law will be narrowly applied” and said, “Sadly, however, there is little reason to believe that Beijing will apply it with restraint.”

  

  European Council president Charles Michel speaks during a press conference in Brussels following a virtual summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang on June 22. The EU has repeatedly expressed its strong concerns about the national security law. Photo: European Council/DPA

  On the contrary, Beijing has good reasons to apply the law narrowly, once you recognise its need for Hong Kong to perform well and efficiently in the process of serving the country’s economic interests at this extremely challenging time.

  It is motivated to eliminate the chaos that 

  hobbled

   the smooth running of the economy through half of 2019, and threatened to infect the 

  Greater Bay Area

   in Guangdong.
• It is motivated by the manifest incapacity of the local Hong Kong administration to tackle the community’s challenges. It is motivated by signs that protesters were no longer simply calling for democratic freedoms, but for 

  independence

   – a red line for Beijing.

  While so many overseas have shown profound prejudice in leaping 

  to condemn

   Beijing’s introduction of the security law, and while I believe their judgments are wrong about Beijing’s incentives to apply the new law with restraint, there should be no doubt that international alarm is legitimate. Beijing would be foolish to disregard the many detailed concern.

  Hong Kong finds itself today in a more precarious place than at any point since the 1984 signing of the 

  Sino-British Joint Declaration

  . As at every stage of the four-decade transition back to Chinese sovereignty, Hong Kong’s community has remained deeply divided over the contract agreed by London and Beijing over their heads.

  All efforts by Beijing over the past 23 years to win hearts and minds have done little to reduce these divides. And, of course, the decision to impose a security law – no matter how reasonable from the point of view of any sovereign government – can only aggravate them.

• If they are ever going to be resolved – and it is likely to take years – there needs to be respect for the legitimate divisions within Hong Kong and for the deep-seated differences between Hong Kong and the mainland.

  If President Xi Jinping’s team want to prevent this initiative from becoming a global diplomatic disaster, then sensitivity is going to be needed by the bucketload.

  The creation on Hong Kong soil of an 

  Office for Safeguarding National Security

  , which answers directly to Beijing, is going to require acutely sensitive management. A right to decide that certain cases should be heard by mainland courts creates highly flammable possibilities.

  

  Anti-government protesters halt on Hennessy Road in Causeway Bay on July 1, the 23rd anniversary of the handover, during a march against the national security law that went ahead despite a police ban. Photo: Sam Tsang

  Above all else, the law must be used sparsely, and with extreme justification. If it in any way threatens the freedoms enshrined in the Basic Law, then the fate of Hong Kong is truly in jeopardy.

  As the Post said in 

  its editorial

   on June 3: “The law is meant to plug loopholes rather than end our freedoms and civil liberties. The world needs to be shown that the ‘two systems’ has not been undermined.”

  Only time will tell. The Legislative Council election in September may be a litmus test. In the meantime, wariness is in order.

Secret Weapon: The B-1 Lancer Bomber Could Fly Under Enemy Radars? by Caleb Larson

Here's What You Need To Remember: Using its variable-geometry wings, the B-1 can sweep its wings back for high altitude, supersonic flight, or fly low, with wings outstretched while hugging the ground. This was the B-1’s secret weapon.

The B-1 Lancer is an impressive long-range, supersonic heavy bomber with variable-geometry wings designed for both supersonic and subsonic speed. Its nickname is The Bone.

New Engines

General Electric developed a new turbofan design for the Lancer that has an afterburner, meaning the airframe can dump additionally fuel into the rear of the engine for greatly increased thrust, albeit at a cost — greatly increased fuel consumption.

The B-1 has four of these GE afterburning turbofan engines for a combined total of 123,000 pounds of thrust, which propels the B-1 to Mach 1.2.

Using its variable-geometry wings, the B-1 can sweep its wings back for high altitude, supersonic flight, or fly low, with wings outstretched while hugging the ground. This was the B-1’s secret weapon.

By flying low to the ground, the B-1 would be able to slip under Soviet air defense radars, which would be unable to distinguish the movement and the size of the B-1 from another movement near the ground.

Upgrades

The B-1 proved to be popular in Afghanistan, where its combination of high speed, long-range, and high payload capacity meant that it could serve as a ground-attack-support platform, despite being originally designed as a nuclear bomber.

Although the planned B-21 Raider stealthy bomber will replace the B-1, an upgrade to the airframe’s displays and communications in 2015 will keep the B-1 flying for at least another decade.

Bumpy Ride

A B-1 pilot said of flying low, "It's abrupt. It was created to have us sneak in low below enemy radars into Russia during the Cold War, employ nuclear weapons, and get out,” although it was not at all a gentile ride.

“It's not soft, not smooth," the pilot said about the low-flight mode. “The up-and-down motion in the B-1 felt more like a roller coaster — making me feel weightless at times or my breakfast coming up at others (still, I kept it down).”

High-Flying Only

Late in 2019, B-1s were restricted from a low-level flight, their signature ability. The reason was stress, lots of stress.

Not pilot stress, but stress on the airframe. The B-1s low-light mode, otherwise known as TERFLW mode (low-altitude, terrain-following) has put a great deal of stress on the airframe. 

The low-level flight is harder on a plane’s airframe than high altitude flight. Up high the atmosphere is thinner, and a plane can glide through the sky with less resistance. Down below, at lower altitudes, the air is thicker, and turbulence is more likely. Although not forbidden, B-1s likely won’t use TERFLW mode anytime soon.

Still, take the opportunity to enjoy this video of a B-1 Lancer flying at about 500 feet.

Is China Building Its Own F-35 Fighter Jets for its Aircraft Carriers? by Kris Osborn

 

The Chinese appear to be preparing to launch a first-of-its-kind new-generation fighter jet in 2021, a move which could signify a large step forward in power-projection and air-attack capability for a country seeking to strengthen its global influence.

Citing an “aviation industry report,” the Chinese-backed Global Times stated that the new plane is likely to be a carrier-launched fighter variant of its fifth-generation J-31 stealth fighter jet. It has long been discussed that China may engineer a new, carrier-based variant of its J-31 jet, in what might appear as a transparent attempt to rival America’s F-35 fighter jet. 

The report speculates that the new plane could be the now-in-development Shenyang J-15 fighter jet but is more likely an FC-31 carrier variant of the J-31 jet. The Global Times reports said the Chinese have been rumored to be amid ongoing modifications to its J-31 jet for the specific purpose of engineering a carrier-launched variant.

The existence of an aircraft such as this could provide some kind of counterbalance to the U.S. Marine Corps’ F-35B fighter jet and the U.S. Navy’s F-35C fighter jet, depending upon its level of technical sophistication. An expeditionary fifth-generation stealth fighter able to operate from Chinese amphibious ships and aircraft carriers does bring new attack possibilities for maritime commanders seeking to project power. The possibility certainly does align with China’s well-known work to build its own indigenous fleet of aircraft carriers.

While there has been much discussion about the extent to which China’s J-31 fighter jet clearly seems to replicate the U.S. F-35 fighter jet in terms of external configuration, many of its internal components may simply not be fully known. Despite what appears to be a transparent attempt to possibly “rip off” F-35 design specs, it is not at all clear if an FC-31 would in fact rival a Navy F-35C. Much of this would rely upon sensor technology, weapons range and onboard computing, as those areas encompass many of the attributes unique to the F-35 fighter jet.

For instance, the F-35 fighter jet not only provides armed multirole air attack support but also functions as an intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aerial node able to find and transmit threat information at long ranges, at times beyond the horizon. The F-35s Distributed Aperture System surround cameras and Electro-Optical Targeting System enables it to operate in a sensor-drone type capacity as well as an attack platform. While designed to be maneuverable, the F-35 fighter jet is engineered to detect threats well in advance of being close enough to require dog-fighting.

A carrier-launched fifth-generation stealth fighter would massively expand China’s ability to project power internationally, especially in places such as the South China Sea where it may be difficult to build runways for a fixed-wing attack. A sea-based fighter could surveil or target island areas without needing to take off and land from one of the islands themselves, thereby making themselves less vulnerable to ground or runway strikes against their air operations. It also goes without saying that fifth-generation air support would change the threat equation for Taiwan should it face an amphibious attack. 

After all, having just fourth-generation aircraft able to launch from carriers, such as U.S. F/A-18s, may limit an ability to conduct operations over areas with extremely advanced air defenses. A stealthy fighter, however, while still at risk against some emerging air defenses, enables global power projection in a substantially different way. It takes little imagination to envision China’s grand ambitions for expanded global influence, as having attack-power projection fortifies their current efforts to expand into many areas of Africa, the Middle East and of course Southeast Asia. 

Check Out the U.S. Army's New High-Tech Joint Light Tactical Vehicle. by Kris Osborn

The Army has added anti-tank missiles, lasers, anti-aircraft systems and drones to its Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) as part of an effort to keep the multi-year program aligned with fast-changing threat developments.

While underway for several years, the weapons upgrades and adjustments were cited by Oshkosh Defense as part of a statement on the Army’s recent order of 248 new JLTVs for the service. The deal underscores the significance of the vehicle and points to its multi-year trajectory, as Oshkosh has been engineering the vehicle for more than a decade. The 248 new vehicles are being added to the thousands of JLTVs which have already been delivered to the service. 

Since its inception, the JLTV has been engineered with a broad series of technologies configured to adjust and modernize as new technologies emerge. While certain things like its TAK-4 independent suspension system and external configuration are likely not changed much since its initial construction, its command and control systems, weapons and technical backbone has likely been upgraded or modified substantially. For instance, emerging cyber and EW technologies, along with modern targeting and C4ISR systems all continue to be added. Oshkosh’s statement included the discussion of its having added a Remote Weapons Station up to 30mm, a technical advance giving soldiers an ability to fire heavier weapons from beneath armor cover by using a computerized video targeting screen. Drone and counter-drone technologies have also been added to the platform. 

Adding newer weapons systems to the platform, such as lasers and anti-drone weapons expands the mission envelope for the vehicle, enabling it to operate under higher-threat major warfare conditions. Lasers can of course attack drones, ground targets and even enemy helicopters at long-ranges as well as perform varying degrees of optical surveillance. They can also be precise and cause less collateral damage to buildings, enemy vehicles or nearby personnel should the vehicle need to attack in an urban area. Advanced sensors, by extension, can greatly expand the reconnaissance missions for the platform as well, giving it the opportunity to function to a greater degree as a forward-operating node in a larger network. 

The JLTV’s adjustment to incorporate a greater degree of air defense is also quite significant, as it aligns with a broader Army strategic move to emphasize heavier weapons and Short-Range-Air-Defense for its combat vehicles. Short Range Air Defense is a combat priority which, Army developers say, has “atrophied” in recent years during the ongoing counterinsurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. Stryker vehicles, for instance, are now armed with an ability to vertically fire Hellfire missiles and even lasers at enemy drones and helicopters as part of the Army’s recognition that combat air defense is again emerging as a significant threat area in today’s great-power threat combat environment. Anti-tank weapons, such as a vehicle-mounted TOW missile also better enable the vehicle to support advancing armored and infantry brigades, particularly if it conducts high-risk scout missions in front of attacking units. 

The world is finally uniting against China’s bully tactics By Steven W. Mosher

World powers are no longer so eager to sit back and let Chinese President Xi Jinping walk all over them.

Twenty Indian soldiers are murdered in a surprise cross-border attack by the People’s Liberation Army. A Philippine fishing boat is sunk in its own territorial waters by increasingly predatory Chinese ships. Peaceful pro-democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong are beaten bloody by riot police on Beijing’s orders. Australia’s farmers and miners are hit with trade sanctions after Canberra suggests that the virus, which came out of China, may have come from . . . China.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has apparently decided that now is the time to assert dominance over an economically prostrate, post-pandemic world. But instead of just rolling over, a growing number of nations are fighting back.

India, for one, is clearly not intimidated. In response to China’s unprovoked attack, the largest democracy in the world has moved 30,000 troops to the Himalayan border. Many Indians are now boycotting “Made in China” products, a task made easier because online retailers like Amazon have been ordered by New Delhi to tell buyers where products are made.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has also raised tariffs on Chinese goods, restricted Chinese investments and banned TikTok and 58 other Chinese apps from Indian phones.

Meanwhile, the people of the Philippines are up in arms over China’s expansionism into areas of the South China Sea claimed by Manilla. When anti-US President Rodrigo Duterte was elected in 2016, he initially ignored popular sentiment and announced a “pivot to Beijing” on the promise of $24 billion in Chinese investments.

Four years later, all that has changed. With the Chinese navy sailing ever closer to Philippine shores and few Chinese projects in progress, Duterte has reversed his earlier decision to terminate his country’s Visiting Forces Agreement with the US. Given a choice between having American or Chinese naval vessels anchored in Subic Bay, the decision was pretty obvious.

The sight of the 7.3 million free people of Hong Kong being crushed under the heel of the communist boot is one the world will not easily forget. It has already prompted UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to offer British citizenship to 3 million Hong Kongers, not to mention take a tougher line toward China itself. Huawei, for example, can kiss its 5G business in the UK goodbye.

Enlarge ImageWorld leaders like UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Indian Minister Narendra Modi are taking a stand against China and their president Xi Jinping.

World leaders like UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi are taking a stand against China and their president Xi Jinping.Storms Media Group; EFE/Shutter­stock; REUTERS; AP

The Australians are also fed up with Beijing’s bare-knuckled efforts to spy on and disrupt their country’s government, infrastructure and industries. To counter the recent surge in cyberattacks, Canberra has promised to recruit at least 500 cyberwarriors, bolstering the country’s online defenses. Meanwhile, an astonishing 94 percent of Australians say they want to begin decoupling their economy from China’s.

The same story is being repeated around the globe. From Sweden to Japan to Czechia, more and more nations are coming to understand China’s mortal threat to the postwar democratic, capitalist world order.

Xi Jinping and the Communist Party that he leads have so badly overplayed their hand that they have, in a mere six months, accomplished what Donald Trump could not in almost four years: They have unified the world against China.

And communist leader Xi has only himself to blame.

On Wednesday, Congress unanimously voted to sanction China for its new security law that would effectively nullify Hong Kong’s legal system and put Beijing in charge. But America cannot fight China alone. And now, thanks to Xi’s aggressive policies, we won’t have to.

As someone who has been warning about the China threat for decades, I take grim satisfaction in watching this new alliance crystallize with each new misstep by Beijing.

As Napoleon Bonaparte once remarked, “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

Why doesn’t anyone want to buy 'cheap' Chinese Fighter Jets?

The high-tech wannabees of Asia are going through a bit of a rough patch lately. India has to postpone its Chandrayaan-2 moon mission just an hour before launch, due to a “technical snag.” Japan is imposing controls on the transfer of certain technologies to South Korea, which could impair the latter’s smartphone and semiconductor sectors.

A bit more obscure but just as critical a development is affecting China’s fighter jet business. The Pakistanis have announced that they will start building a more advanced version of its JF-17 combat aircraft, for deployment in 2020.

With these new “Block III” versions, Pakistan will by the middle of the next decade operate up to 200 JF-17 fighters. And each JF-17 it purchases means one less opportunity for China to sell its own fighter jets to its best customer.

China’s rise as a global arms exporter ::

As I noted before in How China weaponizes arms sales, China has come a long ways in terms of being an international arms exporter. During the 1980s and 1990s, most of its product was decidedly antiquated and obsolete, often knock-offs of Soviet systems developed during the 1950s (such as the MiG-21 fighter jet or the Silkworm antiship missile).

Since the turn of the 21st century, however, China’s defense industry has modernized to the extent that it is now able to offer an impressive array of armaments, competitive with their Western counterparts. These include the K-8 trainer jets, C-701 and C-802 antiship cruise missiles, and the FN-6 man-portable surface-to-air missile. These systems, along with modern self-propelled howitzers, armored vehicles, multiple rocket launchers, frigates, and submarines, have been increasingly sold around the world.

In particular, China has quite recently but also quite significantly become a key exporter of armed drones or unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs), such as its Wing Loong “Pterodactyl” and Caihong drones. Beijing has sold more than US$700 million worth of UCAVs to militaries in Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Myanmar (Burma), Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, and the United Arab Emirates.

Consequently, according to data put out by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), China captured 5.2% of the global market during the period 2014-2018, putting it in the number four slot among the world’s biggest arms exporters. More and more countries have been buying Chinese arms; during the period 2014-18, China exported arms to 53 countries, compared with 41 in 2009-13 and 32 in 2004-2008. In recent years, China was the single largest supplier to Africa, capturing nearly one-third of the continent’s overall arms market, drawing customers away Europe, Russia, and the United States.


Where are the fighter jet sales?

And yet no one appears to be buying Chinese fighter jets. China manufactures at least one modern totally indigenous combat aircraft, the J-10. The J-10 is a “fourth-generation-plus” fighter, featuring a canard-and-delta-wing airframe, a fly-by-wire flight control system, and an advanced “glass” cockpit. Newer versions will likely be equipped with an advanced active phased-array radar. The J-10 can launch a variety of air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions.

The J-10 is technologically the equal of the US F-16, and it is probably superior in performance to the JF-17. Yet it has garnered no overseas sales. The same can be said so far of other Chinese combat aircraft, including the JH-7 fighter-bomber (which has been in production for over 20 years) or the F-8IIM (a version of the J-8 fighter developed expressly for export).

It is true that the JF-17 is actually a joint Pakistani-Chinese fighter jet. It was inaugurated by the Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC) in the early 1990s as the FC-1. Pakistan soon joined as a full partner and launch customer. Much of the technology (particularly the avionics, like the radar) are Chinese, although the engine is a licensed-produced version of the RD-33, developed by Russia.

According to news reports, the Pakistanis produce 58% of the JF-17s airframe and subsystems – including the wings, tail, and forward fuselage sections – as well as perform final assembly. CAC is responsible for the remaining 42%, particularly the mid- and rear- fuselages (and presumably the engine as well).

So China makes around 40 cents on every dollar with each JF-17 produced (although it probably has to kick some of this back to Russia as part of the licensed-production deal for the RD-33).


China: creating its own competition?

Only a handful of JF-17s have been sold to countries other than Pakistan: 16 to Myanmar and three to Nigeria. Additional sales have been hard in coming. Sri Lanka, Sudan, Malaysia, and Zimbabwe have “discussed” the idea of buying the aircraft, but so far no deals have materialized. As of now, the JF-17 depends almost entirely on the Pakistani Air Force (PAF) buying it.

But each JF-17 sale steals a sale from the Chinese directly. Case in point, the PAF was at one time thinking about acquiring up to three dozen J-10 fighters. Eventually, however, this deal fell through, and the Pakistanis went ahead with production of the Block III JF-17.

As Chinese fighter jets like the J-10 and the JH-7 age technologically, their “sellability” will continue to erode. It may be that FC-31 – China’s candidate for an entry-level fifth-generation fighter – may succeed where these earlier fighters did not, but it’s an open question at this point.

Ironically, China’s inability to successfully market a totally indigenous fighter comes at a time when the global fighter jet business stands to expand rapidly. According to the Teal Group, the global fighter market could be worth as much as US$520 billion over the next decade. Unless China can come up with a competitive fighter jet, it could miss out on much of this business.