III. Chronology of the Operation “Infektion 2.0”
Contrary to a Soviet operation that lasts several years, the Chinese operation was
rolled out in a month in 2020, thanks to social media. Not unlike the Soviets, the
Chinese reacted rapidly to a virus that they had not anticipated: HIV, like the Covid-19,
are phenomenon that provided these countries’ agents with an opportunity to target their
adversaries with disinformation. As it happens, with the coronavirus, the Russians – not
the Chinese – were the first to react: on January 20, 2020, a TV channel funded by the
Russian Ministry of Defense, Zvezda, was the first media to describe the virus as a U.S.
biological weapon, during an interview with Igor Nikulin, an “expert” that often appears
on propaganda TV channels.30 He was previously known for denying Bashar al-Assad’s use
of chemical weapons in Syria,31 and for accusing Americans of using biological weapons
for instance.32 Meanwhile, in China, when a resident of Inner Mongolia circulated the same
story on the app Kuaishou six days later (a video viewed 14,000 times), he was charged with
spreading rumors and detained for ten days.33 And yet, Chinese diplomats and media were
spreading that same rumor a month later. In the meantime, Beijing came to understand
that there was an opportunity following the “intense internal criticisms” that the CCP
had to face for its management of the crisis,34 and which was taken up globally, including
in the United States. On the defensive, the Party-State reacted by diverting the atten-
tion, accusing Washington of being responsible for the pandemic. Strictly speaking, the
28. Ladislav Bittman, The KGB and Soviet Disinformation: An Insider’s View (Washington: Brassey’s Inc, 1985).
29. It could be interesting to question the possible influence of the Soviet model of disinformation on American
“covert actions.”
30. Aleksandra Arsentieva, “Эксперт связал вспышку пневмонии в Китае с испытанием биологического
оружия” (“An Expert Linked the Epidemy of Pneumonia in China to a Biological Weapon Tryout”), Zvezda (20 Jan.
2020), https://archive.vn/KVmZd.
31. For instance: “Accusé à tort? Damas ne possède plus d’armes chimiques depuis 2014” [“Wrongly Accused?
Damascas Has no Chemical Weapons since 2014”], Sputnik (5 Apr. 2017).
32. Weaponized: How Rumors about Covid-19’s Origins led to a Narrative Arms Race, DFRLab, Atlantic Council
(Feb. 2021), 16-17
33. Erika Kinetz, “Anatomy of a Conspiracy: With COVID, China Took Leading Role,” AP News (15 Feb. 2021).
34. Ibid.
596
operation started on February 22, with the use of a Chinese study on the transmission
of the virus, which had been published the previous day: based on 93 complete genomes
of the virus, the scientists defended that the virus could have been imported from a place
other than the Huanan market, in Wuhan.35 The sequence of events then unfolded as such:
• February 22: The Global Times (→ p. 181) published an article that evoked the con-
cerns of the Chinese government following a Japanese report, on TV Asahi, that affirmed
that the virus could have originated in the United States.36 This article was covered by the
People’s Daily on February 23 which, via its partners (→ p. 189), had it published abroad as
well, including in the Helsinki Times (February 24),37 and in the New Zealand Herald (Febraury
26).38 It contributed to the international circulation of the rumor.
• February 27: the Chinese epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan (钟南山), who discovered
the SARS virus in 2003, explained during a press conference that the coronavirus could
have originated outside of China.39
• March 4: the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs joined the fray through its deputy
spokesperson, Zhao Lijian (→ p. 232). During a press conference, he quoted the decla-
rations made by Zhong Nanshan.
35. Yu Wenbin, Tang Guangda, Zhang Li, and Richard T. Corlett, “Decoding Evolution and Transmissions of
Novel Pneumonia Coronavirus Using the Whole Genomic Data,” ChinaXiv:202002.00033 (21 Feb. 2020), https://
archive.vn/cqUqj.
36. Hu Yuwei and Zhang Han, “US CDC Refutes TV Asahi Story, Claiming No Evidence Shows Flu Deaths in US
Were Caused by Coronavirus,” Global Times (22 Feb. 2020).
37. https://archive.vn/lrFji.
38. The article was since deleted from its website.
39. 韦杰夫 (Wei Jiefu) 蔡敏婕 (Cai Minjie), “钟南山谈新冠肺炎治疗热点问题: 不可能一个月内研发出
新 药” (“Zhong Nanshan Discusses the Polemical Question of the Treatment Against the Coronavirus-Induced
Pneumonia: It Is Not Possible to Create a New Drug in a Month”), 中国新闻网 (China News Service) (27 Feb. 2020),
https://archive.vn/g0Jji.
597
• March 7: the Chinese embassy in South Africa took to Twitter to relay the words of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokesman on the unknown origin of the coronavirus. Without
certainty on the origin of the virus, the ambassador added that it was not “made in China.”40
• March 12: the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokesman, Hua Chunying, repeated
the statement of Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, acknowledging in front of the House Oversight Committee of the U.S. Congress
that several cases of the Covid-19 had mistakenly been labeled as flu. For that reason, the
spokeswoman rejected the nickname “Chinese virus.” At about the same time, the ministry’s
other spokesperson, Zhao Linjiang, wondered, in a tweet, about the involvement of the
US Army, which he deemed a possible origin of the coronavirus. He instrumentalized the
speech given by Robert Redfield; he also highlighted the presence of a US team at the 7th
Military World Games that took place in Wuhan in October and November 2019, implying
that the Americans could have infected the Chinese population in Wuhan.41
40. “No Confirmed Case of COVID-19 Imported from China to Africa,” Website of the PRC Embassy in South
Africa (17 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/rrlqe.
41. US Department of Defense, “Military World Games,” https://bit.ly/3oJDjj0.
598
• March 13: in two successive messages, Zhao Lijian referred his Twitter followers to
two articles published by a Larry Romanoff, on globalresearch.ca (mondialisation.ca in
its French version), an emanation from the Center for Research on Globalization (CRG),
a self-described independent think tank based in Montreal (→ p. 602). These two articles
endorsed the theory of an American-made virus. During this “peak” of March 12-13,
Zhao tweeted no less than eleven times about this topic and his messages were “cited
over 99,000 times over the next six weeks, in at least 54 languages.”42 They were relayed
by Chinese diplomats and media, but also “Venezuela’s foreign minister and RT’s cor-
respondent in Caracas, as well as Saudi accounts close to the kingdom’s royal family.”43
Meanwhile, the Global Times published an article explaining that the United States
was engaged in an informational war against China to make Beijing responsible for the
apparition of the Covid-19. The article highlighted the important number of persons
(37,000) who had died from the flu in the U.S. in 2019, implying that some deaths might
have been caused by the Covid-19 instead.44
42. Kinetz, “Anatomy of a conspiracy.”
43. Ibid.
44. These numbers are not notably high: 61,000 Americans died from the flu the previous year. See: “Estimated
Influenza Illnesses, Medical visits, Hospitalizations, and Deaths in the United States – 2017–2018 Influenza Season,”
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, https:// www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm.
599
An article that covered the hypothesis of an American responsibility largely circulated
the same day on both WeChat (→ p. 196) and the Guancha website (→ p. 491).45 It
evoked in particular the existence of a petition deposited on the dedicated website of
the White House to demand that the U.S. government tells the truth about Fort Detrick.
It then described a series of strange coincidences: that Fort Detrick closed in July 2019,
a virulent flu in the United States (it never happened), a drill on fighting pandemics
organized in the United States in October, the emergence of the coronavirus in China
and, finally, the suppression of online videos that evoked the closing of Fort Detrick.
Its author explained that the petition had been deleted from the website of the U.S.
government because it had not received the necessary votes (100,000) in 30 days to
be kept online. Furthermore, the article mentioned the evidence uncovered by Larry
Romanoff but seemed to lean toward the hypothesis of an accidental infection through
U.S. sportspersons present in Wuhan in October and November 2019.
• March 19; the Chinese national TV channel CGTN (→ p. 176) published an article
untitled “10 questions for the U.S.: Where did the novel coronavirus come from?”46
in which the author, Wang Fuhua, highlighted the very bad performance of the U.S.
delegation during the games in Wuhan – which had to be hiding something. Was the
delegation carrying the virus? Another question raised suspicion: Wang Fuhua recalled
that the United States had conveniently organized a crisis management drill on a pan-
demic in October 2019, apparently attended by the CIA director. Only one month
45. Circulated on Guancha by a Jin Wei (金微) (https://archive.vn/UDRJE) and on WeChat by “Kekekankan”
(可可看看) (https://archive.vn/JUwym).
46. Wang Fuhua, “10 Questions for the U.S.: Where Did the Novel Coronavirus Come From?” CGTN (19 Mar.
2020), https://archive.vn/fHcky.
600
N
before the pandemic started in China; for the author, it could not have been a mere
coincidence. This is a classical method, even a topos, of conspiracy theories, along with
pseudo-comparatist efforts: an historical analogy gives the illusion of analytical rigor.
For instance, the Spanish flu emerged in the United States but Washington let Spain
bear the responsibility for the pandemic, and it was allegedly doing the same today
with China today.
• March 20: The People Daily (Renmin ribao) published an article by Zhong Sheng47
that quoted Daniel Lucey, an expert on infectious diseases at Georgetown University,
in Washington, who wrote that the first case of coronavirus probably occurred in
November 2019 or earlier.48 Hence, this official newspaper highlighted the uncertainty
around the origin of the virus, which should have encouraged Americans to be more
cautious.
• March 22: CGTN quoted an Italian doctor interviewed by the U.S. radio NPR who
explained that cases of Covid-19 were present in Italy as early as December, perhaps
even November, before the pandemic was known in China.
• March 22: the same day, the Chinese ambassador to the United States, Cui Tiankai
(崔天 凯) declared in an interview that the conspiracy theories that evoked a possible
fabrication of the virus by the U.S. Army were “crazy.”49 On February 9, he had said the
same thing on the TV show “Face the Nation” on CBS.50
47. This pen name had been used by the People’s Daily since November 2008 to write about Chinese positions on
international issues. Zhong Sheng (钟声) means “the ringing of a bell,” the shortened version of 警世钟声 (jingshi
zhongsheng) which can be translated as “the bell rings to alert the world.” The journalists from the People’s Daily thus
play on a homophony because 钟 and 中 (“China”) have the same pronunciation, and 声 also carries the meaning of
“voice.” As such, Zhong Sheng can also be translated as “the voice of China” (https://archive.vn/p0DIv).
48. Zhong Sheng (钟声), “必须抵御污名化之毒” (“We Need to Resist Stigmatization”), Renmin ribao (20 Mar.
2020), https://archive.vn/LG7vo.
49. Jonathan Swan and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “Top Chinese Official Disowns U.S. Military Lab Coronavirus
Conspiracy,” Axios, (22 Mar. 2020).
50. “Transcript: Ambassador Cui Tiankai on “Face the Nation,” February 9, 2020,” CBS News (9 Feb. 2020).
601
• March 23: Zhao Lijian published a message on his Twitter account that sharply con-
trasted with the tone of the previous days.
After this date, the narrative of a U.S involvement in the creation of the Covid-
19 became less prominently relayed – although it did not disappear. The Chinese
Communist Party then adopted a new narrative that presented China as the country that
managed to fight the virus efficiently. It encouraged others to adopt the same methods,
while several voices stressed that the nature of the regime was intimately linked to China’s
success in managing the sanitary crisis.
Hitherto, the narrative portraying the United States as responsible for the emer-
gence of the Covid-19 – either as a voluntary aggression or as an involuntary acci-
dent – circulated rapidly in Chinese diasporas, especially in France and Italy, where the
theories have been abundantly relayed. Two ideas seemed to be recurring: the virus was
presented as a revenge for the discriminations and racism to which the Chinese were sub-
jected at the start of the pandemic; and the fact that an American origin of the virus made
it easier to explain why the virus kept circulating elsewhere, in France and Italy especially,
when China was able to control its circulation.
This is probably the reason why the narrative of a U.S. virus was essentially cir-
culating on WeChat. A WeChat account managed by journalists from the Global Times
continued to defend the conspiracy theory that the coronavirus may have escaped from a
laboratory of the U.S. Army in Fort Detrick. One article covered the history of the labo-
ratory and suggested that it was both highly secretive in its research on biological weapons
and badly regulated.51 Besides, the articles posted on WeChat were also very critical of the
U.S. system. Xiakedao (侠客岛), the WeChat account of the Renmin Ribao – whom we
mentioned previously – affirmed that a third of the Covid-19-related deaths in the United
States occurred in retirement homes, calling it a “massacre approved by the government” (a
similar accusation was also formulated by the Chinese ambassador to France, as we noted
in part three → p. 235).52 As for CCTV’s account, it declared that the United States had
51. Posted by 补壹刀 (Buyidao), Wechat user “buyidao2016,” “这个神秘的美军P4生物实验室，黑历史多到
爆” (“The Darl History of the Mysterious Biological Lab P4 of the US Army”), Wechat (14 May 2020), https://archive.
vn/QBHuv.
52. Result of Weibo Search with the text “#美国死亡病例1/3来自养老院#” (“A Third of the Patients Who
Died in the United States Were in Retirement Houses”) (3 Feb. 2021), https://archive.vn/5vGIz.
602
reduced the budget of the CDC, which explained the Americans’ inability to deal with the
virus. It also inferred that a plot might have explained so much inertia.53
IV. An Analysis of the “Infektion 2.0” Operation
Several aspects and details of this operation deserve to be analyzed. First of all, it is
necessary to return to what constituted the core of Zhao Lijian’s argumentation, in other
words the two articles published by Larry Romanoff.54 We then evaluate the motiva-
tions behind the operation and its effectiveness.
A. The CRG
In the two tweets he published on March 13, Zhao Lijian encouraged his readers to visit
the website of globalreasearch.ca (CRG) to read the articles published by Larry Romanoff.
The CRG was created in 2001 by a Canadian, Michel Chossudovsky, a professor at the
University of Ottawa close to Thierry Meyssan and a regular guest on the Russian channel
RT.55 The CRG is famous for its active role in the “conspirasphere” (its articles are,
for example, taken up on Le Grand Soir, a militant newspaper of “alternative information”
administered by Maxime Vivas, mentioned in the previous part → p. 335) and as a relay
of Russian campaigns of disinformation. In fact, its activities have drawn the attention of
NATO.56 CRG’s English website is visited by a million visitors each month (1.59 million in
February 2020) and the French version by more than 100,000 visitors (113,000 in February
2020).57 Its articles adopy the method used by some Russian media outlets: instrumental-
izing and hijacking neutral voices and serious outlets to deliver a message that reinforces
their own narrative.
One of the two articles written by Larry Romanoff relied on a report presumably pub-
lished by Asahi TV in Japan. It also quoted Shen Yi (沈逸), a professor of international
relations at Fudan University, in Shanghai and, more importantly, a Taiwanese virologist
that intervened in Zhe ! Bushi xinwen (這! 不是新聞)58 (This! This is not information), a TV
show aired on the Taiwanese channel EBC Dongsen Financial News (東森財經新聞台), an
emanation of the Eastern Broadcasting Company (東森電視), formerly known as Eastern
Television (ETTV).59
Using three different sources, including two that were not expected to be partial because
coming from “adversaries” of China (a Taiwanese virologist and a Japanese TV show), Larry
Romanoff hoped to bring some objective veneer to his words. In reality, it was only an illu-
sion. First, no link to the Japanese TV show was given; only to an article of the Chinese Global
53. Posted by 玉渊谭天 (Yuyuantantian), on Weibo (14 May 2020), https://archive.vn/7A0JX.
54. Since deleted, but archived: Larry Romanoff, “China’s Coronavirus: A Shocking Update. Did the Virus
Originate in the US?” Global Research (4 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/2LJR0; “COVID-19: Further Evidence that the
virus Originated in the US,” Global Research (11 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/fJYZw.
55. See the Conspiracy Watch webpage dedicated to Mondialisation.ca: https://www.conspiracywatch.info/
mondialisation-ca.
56. Nathan Vanderklippe, “Chinese Official Promoting Unfounded Canadian Theory that Coronavirus Has Roots
in U.S. Military,” The Globe and Mail, (14 Mar. 2020).
57. Data provided by “SimilarWeb.”
58. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvdCKimJzeQ.
59. The show was largely circulated on WeChat and other platforms.
603
Times mentioning the Japanese program. In fact, Romanoff simply quoted the Global Times,
not the Japanese report. Then, without assessing the argumentation of the Taiwanese virol-
ogist – who used a set of scientific tools to show that the virus could only have come from
the United States because the largest number of variants of the virus was in that country – it
should be noted that ETTV was already known for its pro-Guomindang (KMT) and pro-Bei-
jing positions. As for Shen Yi, his words (which are quoted without a verifiable source) simply
reasserted that China kept wondering about the primary origin of the virus. In conclusion, the
evidence shown by Larry Romanoff was weak and certainly not as neutral as he said.
B. Larry Romanoff
The author of the articles, Larry Romanoff, introduced himself as a former consultant
and current professor at Fudan University, in Shanghai, the city where he supposedly lives.
He mentioned only one way to contact him: an email address on the Chinese messaging
service QQ (2186604556@qq.com). His first article was published on globalresearch.ca on
September 24, 2019, in which he described the Tian’anmen events as a U.S. attempt at pro-
moting a color revolution in China. He wrote 72 articles in six months, all tainted with
conspiracy theory, and, after late January 2020, almost all of them dealt with the coro-
navirus. Even though they are not academic articles, this was still an important activity.
Investigating Larry Romanoff ’s background provided few results. Matthew Brown, jour-
nalist at USA Today, tried to contact Romanoff to obtain more details on some elements
mentioned in his articles, but without success.60 Larry Romanoff could not be reached.
Moreover, there is no recent photo of him. The Russian Pravda, which published six of
his articles between January 9 and March 9, 2021, illustrated his biography with a photo…
of Ernest Hemingway.61
This biography simply copied the way he presents himself on his websites “The Moon
of Shanghai (上海的月亮) – moonofshanghai.com (created in April 202062) and bluemoo-
nofshanghai.com (in October 202063) – but without any picture of him there as well. We
could not find videos either. A sole audio recording was posted online in April 2020.64
The Chinese-speaking Internet describes Larry Romanoff (拉里·罗曼诺夫) as an
“all-powerful” professor (万能65) or as a “world-famous scientist” (世界著名科学家66)
60. Mathhew Brown, “Fact Check: Coronavirus Originated in China, Not Elsewhere, Researchers and Studies Say,”
USA Today (16 Mar. 2020).
61. https://archive.vn/KgcS7.
62. https://archive.vn/nguZl
63. https://archive.vn/ZIuBn
64. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKVnIxQzfvs
65. https://archive.vn/97xDk.
66. https://archive.vn/ANw3n.
604
who is presumably a visiting professor at Fudan University, teaching in the MBA
– despite the lack of mention of his name on the English and Chinese versions of
the website of the prestigious Shanghai university. The managers of the MBA pro-
gram interviewed by the Wall Street Journal confirmed not knowing him, either as “Larry
Romanoff,”67 or under his presumed LinkedIn pseudonym, “Larry Long,” a “visiting
professor” at Fudan University, trained at the University of Calgary, and now teaching in
the former’s MBA program.68
Nonetheless, this fake profile gives some interesting information since it lists bearcanada.com
as its personal site, which is no longer online but whose archives show that it had three distinct
lives.69 During the first one, between 2000 and 2005, bearcanada.com was the website of
Treasures of the Orient Inc, a Calgary-based company, North American representative
of Bear Productions, a Hong Kong-based company producing music for a children’s choir (the
Bear Children’s Choir of Hong Kong), and an importer of Asian products:
Screenshot of the bearcanada.com contact page on November 29, 2004
67. James T. Areddy, “Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory Claims It Began in the U.S. – and Beijing Is Buying It,” The
Wall Street Journal (26 Mar. 2020).
68. https://www.linkedin.com/in/larry-long-a090b9a/ (https://archive.ph/PWTja).
69. https://web.archive.org/web/changes/http://bearcanada.com/.
605
Before it changed address in July/August 2001, the company’s address was:70
Twenty years later, the phone number still appeared on the Hong Kong website of the
children’s choir.71 As for the fax number, in Canadian reverse directories it appears as a
telephone number assigned to “Larry Romanoff,” who was indeed domiciled at this
address.72
And indeed, Romanoff was at the time the owner of this company, as confirmed
by a photo published in the Calgary Herald in 2001, because of a news item (Canada
Post sent him by mistake an invoice of more than $140 million73). Larry Romanoff was
introduced as an entrepreneur with a business importing music and toys for children from
China. The article is illustrated by a picture of him, taken in July 2001, which reveals the
name and address of his company, which correspond to the one of the bearcanada.com
website.
Picture of Larry Romanoff published in the Calgary Herald in July 2001 (©David Moll/Calgary Herald).
At that time, Romanoff was importing Chinese music. The manager of the Bear Children’s
Choir in Hong Kong, from whom he ordered 100 CDs for resale in North America, found
“a little weird” that “some Canadian guy only speaking English [sold] Cantonese music.”74
70. A change of address occurred between July and August 2001, the new address being “Suite 304, 110 - 2nd Ave.
S. E., Calgary, AB, Canada T2G 0B3.” The rest remained unchanged.
71. https://archive.vn/zZTwy.
72. https://www.telephoneinverse.com/directory/lookup-403-237. See also: https://www.locatefamily.com/
Street-Lists/Canada/AB/T2P/T2P0E7/index.html.
73. Two bills for $70.8 million and $71.3 million, instead of the $103 he owed. Calgary Herald (13 Jul. 2001), B2.
74. Areddy, “Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory.”
606
In 2002, Romanoff transferred parts of his business on another website, an online market-
place hosted at members.shaw.ca/toyscanada/toymain.html.75
One can assume, as the Wall Street Journal does, that this “Larry” Romanoff of 2001 is
the “Lawrence Delvin” Romanoff who left another trail in the same Calgary Herald three
years earlier. A 1998 article reported that he was arrested in 1995 for trafficking in used
stamps that he cleaned and resold for new.76 At his trial three years later, he pleaded guilty
but also good faith, explaining that he had tried to raise funds for his church, and produc-
ing a letter of thanks that Mother Teresa had personally sent him in April 1995. The article
presented him as 55 years old and owner of a small advertising agency.
If this is indeed the same person (who would therefore be 58 years old in the photo
above), it would mean that he quickly reoriented his carrer after his 1998 trial, since his
company Treasures of the Orient Inc. was created the following year. The Alberta Business
Registry indicates that Treasures of the Orient Inc. was registered in September 1999
and deregistered in 2005.77
And for good reason, in 2005 the home page of bearcanada.com indicated a move
from Calgary to Shanghai:
Screenshot from the bearcanada.com website, on November 26, 2005.78
His departure was confirmed by a readers’ letter published by The Economist in July 2005
in which Larry Romanoff signed a letter from Calgary.79 In 2008, in another letter mailed
to the Globe and Mail this time, he presented himself as “businessman living in Shanghai”
critical of the Chinese policy of the Prime Minister Stephen Harper.80
Thus began the second life of bearcanada.com, which was a transitional phase: between
2006 and 2009, the site was essentially an empty shell, with only the home page changed.
It presented a “Canadian business, staffed by Canadians, and resident in Shanghai” that
offered “a variety of products manufactured in China”.
75. https://web.archive.org/web/20021220081932/http://www.members.shaw.ca/toyscanada/toymain.html.
76. “Used stamp sales admitted,” Calgary Herald (22 Jan. 1998), B5.
77. https://albertacorporations.com/treasures-of-the-orient-inc.
78. https://web.archive.org/web/20051126062205/http://bearcanada.com/.
79. In which he explained having sold his house in Calgary in 1984 for CA$131,000 (Letters, The Economist (7 Jul.
2005)).
80. “Canada has missed the boat on the miracle of China’s development. I believe Stephen Harper’s foreign policy
is thoughtless and short-sighted, subject to a right-wing blindness for which all Canadians will pay dearly” (Larry
Romanoff, “As China’s friend, we’re history,” The Globe and Mail (28 May 2008), A16).
607
Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com on October 12, 2006.81
It is the third life of the site that is the most interesting as far as we are concerned, because
it is the one that reveals the Larry Romanoff we know today. In 2010, bearcanada.com,
completely redesigned, became an anti-American and pro-Chinese conspiracy site.
Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com on October 12, 2011.82
81. https://web.archive.org/web/20061012014843/http://www.bearcanada.com:80/.
82. https://web.archive.org/web/20111103223650/http://www.bearcanada.com/index.html.
608
The site is also particularly anti-Semitic, with a dedicated section containing numer-
ous articles and unambiguous visuals:
Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com/fae/fae.html on July 12, 2012.83
The articles were signed 龙信明, which literally means “Larry Romanoff,” as did the
header where the same name was indicated on the left. In a section entitled “Shanghai
Diary,” the author published photos and comments from his walks around the city. Several
remarks (about missing Canadian lobsters, comparing climates or prices between Shanghai
and Calgary, his nephew Eddie in Canada, his return to Canada for Christmas, etc.) leave
little doubt that the author was indeed Larry Romanoff, the Canadian from Calgary. He
published a very large number of articles, on a wide variety of subjects. This version of
the site was active between 2010 and 2013: publications were less frequent in 2013, the
site stopped evolving from July 2013 and disappeared between May and December
2014. It has since been offline.
In 2012-2013, several “alternative” news sites reposted its articles, including 4thme-
dia.org, the English version of the “April Internet” website we mentioned in Part II due
its links to the CYL (→ p. 77). One of the most shared articles is a rewriting of the events
of Tian’anmen, which would not at all have happened as the “Western” media described
it.84 These articles are signed “doctor” or “professor Long Xinming of Fudan University,”
presented as the founder and author of the website bearcanada.com.85 Long Xinming, 龙
信明 in Chinese, is the alias that Larry Romanoff admitted using. He also signed
“Larry Romanoff (龙信明)” in 2010 and in 2020.86 The LinkedIn page we mentioned
earlier is actually a mix of the two names (“Larry Long”). The equivalence Larry Romanoff
= Long Xinming (龙信明) = founder and author of boardcanada.com is therefore
indisputable.
In addition, the link between the third version of boardcanada.com (2010-2014)
and Larry Romanoff ’s current sites, moonofshanghai.com and bluemoonofshang-
hai.com (since 2020), is also established since we find on both his current websites the
banner that appeared previously on boardcanada.com:
On the left, header of boardcanada.com (2010-2014); on the right, extract of moonofshanghai.com
and bluemoonofshanghai.com (since 2020).
83. https://web.archive.org/web/20120712073754/http://www.bearcanada.com/fae/fae.html.
84. https://archive.ph/5GwUd (original publication on bearcanada.com: https://archive.ph/eZ8tY).
85. See for instance: https://archive.vn/QATd9; https://archive.vn/zNAIw; https://archive.vn/DaLSL; https://
archive.ph/5GwUd.
86. https://archive.vn/tb5tl and https://archive.vn/nguZl.
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Romanoff did not appear to have used this alias after 2013. Moreover, when Ramesh
Thakur, former UN Under Secretary General and Vice-Rector of the UN University, revis-
ited in 2019 the site on which “Long Xinming’s” article on Tian’anmen was published in
2013, he found that ”the author’s name had changed to Bhaiaidil Fiverr, which might
raise questions about authenticity”.87 The site in question is since inaccessible, and Bhaiaidil
Fiverr is a unique name, which is not used anywhere else.
Between 2010 and 2012, Romanoff was also one of the contributors to the collective
blog Hidden Harmonies, created in February 2010, on which he reposted some of his
articles. Note that his biographical presentation did not change between 2010 and 2021.
Source : https://archive.vn/tb5tl.
He did not contribute to Hidden Harmonies for seven years, then came back in March
2020.88 He was listed as a contributor again, and re-published one of the two articles on
the coronavirus originally published on GlobalResearch.ca and relayed by Zhao Lijian on
March 13.89
In conclusion, while a quick analysis of Larry Romanoff ’s latest publications
(2019-2020) could legitimately lead to the belief that he was “probably a fake blog-
ger created from scratch by the Chinese to echo their messages,” all of the above
makes this hypothesis less credible as the means deployed to create Romanoff ’s “leg-
end” would be disproportionate to the expected gain.90 Most likely, Larry Romanoff
exists and is a “useful idiot,” perhaps influenced and mentored by the Party-State.
However, several elements in his trajectory remain to be clarified: his initial links
with China (how does a Canadian from Calgary become the North American represen-
tative of a choir of Hong Kong children?); his anti-American and anti-Semitic conspir-
acy theories that suddenly emerged in 2010 (had he been developing them for a longer
period?); and the “gap” of about six years, between 2013 (the end of bearcanada.com)
and 2019 (his debut on GlobalResearch.ca), during which this already prolific author
seemed to have stopped publishing, at least under his own name as well as under his alias
Long Xinming (why?).
87. Ramesh Thakur, “Which Tian’anmen narrative is true?,” The Japan Times (6 Jun. 2019).
88. In fact, he was no longer listed as a contributor in this capture of a June 2015 presentation: https://archive.
ph/R32Tk.
89. https://archive.vn/fGFIF and https://archive.vn/Clsmv.
90. Antoine Bondaz, quoted in Vincent Nouzille, “La grande offensive des espions chinois,” Le Figaro Magazine (17
Jul. 2020), 42. In the unpublished IRSEM note of April 2020, we ourselves envisaged that Larry Romanoff could be a
front name, a virtual agent, behind which hides an agency of the Party-State apparatus, or a non-state actor in its pay,
which would imply relatively important means of coordination (Charon, L’opération “Covid-19”).
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C. The motivations behind the operation
There is no lack of possible motives to explain the CCP’s decision to launch such an
operation, and they were mentioned all through this report: creating a diversion for the
Chinese population toward an evident scapegoat; offering an indirect contribution
to the perennity of the regime; or an easier switch to the narrative presenting China
as benevolent by concentrating attacks on the United States. It might also have
been an attempt at weakening the democratic model of government with the narra-
tive on the “good” sanitary governance, and even with the efficient Chinese model of crisis
management that was used in targeting the public of “soft targets” (Italy, Spain, Serbia…),
with important mediatic resources. The operation could also be partly explained by the
weakening belief among the party’s leadership that China needs to maintain good relations
with the United States.
This operation could also be understood as a Chinese retaliation, or a warning
sent to the United States, following a series of particularly offensive decisions taken by
Washington in February: on the 10th, four Chinese soldiers from the 54th research institute
were criminally charged for the 2017 Equifax hack (image below);91 Huawei was charged
with extorsion on the 13th;92 and Washington decided to label Chinese state media as CCP
agents on the 17th.93 It is however impossible to confirm that hypothesis with the informa-
tion at our disposal at the moment, but the proximity of the events deserved to be noted.
Now, we need to explain the reasons behind the end of the operation “Infektion 2.0.,”
or at least behind its reduced intensity. Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian interpreted it as a sign
of the adoption of Russian methods by China.94 With such an interpretation, Cui Tiankai’s
declarations would thus be motivated by the will to spread contradictory slogans to confuse
the enemy. But it might also have been done to appease the United States – which is all the
more possible as the CCP could leave the fake information circulating unattended,
finding its own relays in the conspiracy spheres in Europe and in the United States, or in
Chinese diasporas.
91. Brian Barrett, “How 4 Chinese Hackers Allegedly Took Down Equifax,” WIRED (10 Feb. 2020); see also: FBI,
“Chinese PLA Members, 54th Research Institute,” https://bit.ly/3aAvmb0.
92. “Chinese Telecommunications Conglomerate Huawei and Subsidiaries Charged in Racketeering Conspiracy
and Conspiracy to Steal Trade Secrets,” The US Department of Justice (13 Feb. 2020).
93. Lara Jakes and Steven Lee Myers, “U.S. Designates China’s Official Media as Operatives of the Communist
State,” The New York Times (18 Feb. 2020).
94. Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “China Takes a Page from Russia’s Disinformation Playbook,” Axios (25 Mar.
2020).
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D. The Operation’s efficiency
It is too early to evaluate the efficacity of an operation the consequences of which may
be felt over a few years and through unexpected channels. The future will tell us how the
belief in an American origin of the coronavirus settled in the minds. At the moment, the
Chinese narrative has seldom been reused, which could be a sign of resistance in the tar-
geted societies, except perhaps in Chinese diasporas. That said, the operation undeniably
contributes to the fragilization of democratic societies by insidiously questioning the
nature of their institutions and by attacking the very possibility of truth, which is the key
to consent in liberal societies.
V. An Undeniable Russification of Chinese methods
For the authors, this operation is interesting because it confirms the Russification/
sovietization of Chinese methods of disinformation. To illustrate this evolution, we
can simply bring back the seven steps identified earlier by the authors of The New York
Times’s article: (→ p. 594):
• Primo, China, like the USSR before, promptly reacted and saw an opportunity for
concealed disinformation in the Covid-19.
• Secundo, there again, the Soviet method was precisely respected. The idea of a virus
created by the U.S. Army and implanted in Wuhan through the World Military Games is
so difficult to conceive that it could only be true.
• Tertio, the Chinese lie was built on enough truthful elements to make it credible: the
speech delivered by Robert Redfield on earlier cases of Covid-19, the near coincidence
between the games in Wuhan and the epidemic, the U.S. drill on a similar scenario a
month before the epidemic, the uncertainty over the exact origin of the virus and on
its initial transmission by animals, the historical analogy with the Spanish flu. All these
elements reinforced the plausibility of the Chinese narrative.
• Quarto, the Chinese hand was largely hidden, at least without a thorough investiga-
tion. Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs relayed elements made public by
third-party actors. The Party never directly advanced new arguments, and simply relayed
them – such as the Soviets did. Larry Romanoff could be perceived as a neutral actor.
• Quinto, useful idiots were legions: the Taiwanese virologist was one of them, as were
Michel Chossudovsky and Larry Romanoff. The WHO could be listed as well as it kept
defending the Chinese version against all odds.
• Sexto, like the Soviets, China denied any involvement. When the narrative changed,
after the intervention of Cui Tiankai on U.S. TV, the Chinese government evoked demo-
cratic processes internal to the party to explain the diverging opinions among diplomats.
Yet, all this could be seen as a pure construction because the implementation of the
operation by Zhao Lijian, a mere diplomat, gave an opportunity for the party to present
his declarations as an isolated and unofficial position. But it is unimaginable that the
Party left a high-ranking diplomat say such things, for several weeks, without making its
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disapproval known. Hence, the narrative advertised by Zhao was validated by Chinese
authorities.
• Septimo, this is where China seemed to have kept its distance from the “ideal type”
of the Soviet operation. The Chinese campaign ended too quickly and without enough
time to assess its reach. It is also impossible to tell what the hopes of the regime were:
briefly diverting the Chinese public by weakening an adversary? Forcefully inscribing the
possible American creation of the virus in the minds? Or was it a more “experimental”
approach to an operation, one that could pave the way for more complex disinformation
activities in the future?
Similarly to the Soviets, the Chinese have an integrated vision of political warfare: “active
measures” are routine methods used by the CCP that involve numerous and diverse actors.
But the exact level of coordination between these actors remains a question mark.
Did diplomats act on their own initiative? It seems improbable. The articles published
during the operation also suggested a common action with the propaganda arms of the
Party.
Finally, we found that the coronavirus did not simply lead to the implementation of a
Chinese influence operation modeled on the Russian and Soviet operations, but also to
concurring actions that named the United States as the source of the virus. For instance,
an article published by RT highjacked the words of Wilbur Ross, the U.S. Secretary of
Commerce, to increase the perception that the United States had an economic interest in
seeing the virus circulate.95 For that reason, the Russian narrative was easily inscribed in
the Chinese narrative and it provided the latter with a breath of fresh air by bringing
it to a larger public. In fact, a possible cooperation between Russian and Chinese actors
is one of the questions to which the conclusion of the present report will try to answer.
95. “Feast in Time of Plague? Trump Official Says China Coronavirus is Good for US Economy,” RT (31 Jan.
2020), https://archive.vn/nXgbo.
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SUMMARY OF THE FOURTH PART
Taiwan and Hong Kong are on the frontline of the “political warfare” waged by Beijing: first
because they are CCP priorities but also because they are outposts, training grounds, and “R&D
lab” for Chinese operations – which are later perfected and implemented on other targets world-
wide. This is not different from how Georgia and Ukraine were useful to Russian operations.
The first step to widen the circle of Chinese operations targeted Australia and New Zealand.
Then, it reached new targets globally, such as Europe and North America (among others). This
part introduced six case studies: Taiwan, Singapore, Sweden, Canada, an operation that targeted
Hong Kong protestors in 2009, and another that framed the coronavirus as an American cre-
ation.
On Taiwan, Beijing does intervene from the outside: the traditional Chinese media form a
powerful system to disseminate Party propaganda, but they have only limited influence. As the
Party became aware of it, new dedicated outlets were created, including VTS, CHBC and Hai-
feng – all covers for the PLA Base 311. However, most Chinese influence operations use local
relays, following Lenin who stated that “the easiest way to capture a fortress is from within.” It
allows the Party-State to hide its tracks and increase the likelihood of positive results. Among
these relays are Taiwanese media outlets that are enticed and/or forced to follow Beijing through
various means (including access to the Chinese market). There are cases of Taiwanese outlets
censoring themselves to do business in China for instance. But there are other options: adver-
tising contracts, equity participations through the purchase of shares (and sometimes overall
control of the company), buyouts by Taiwanese tycoons – as illustrated by the emblematic pur-
chase of the China Times corporation by Want Want, with clear consequences for its editorial
line – and additional levers such as clandestine funding, nominations to key positions, or bilateral
forums. Beijing also relies on private cyber-armies, i.e. groups of individuals that can be hired to
wage campaigns for/against something/someone; political parties (the KMT has become less
central as the Party-State is seeking to diversify its channels, with three small pro-unification par-
ties serving as its relays: the New Party (NP), the Chinese Unification Promotion Party (CUPP)
and the Home Party (HP)). Politicians are also targeted individually for their possible or proven
pro-Chinese inclinations and based on their strategic position in the Taiwanese political sphere.
Among the influencers and other intermediaries used by Beijing, there are groups and personal-
ities from the cultural and artistic spheres, civic organizations, networks of Buddhist and Taoist
temples, business circles, soldiers, YouTubers, discontent citizens, Taiwanese living abroad (in
mainland China) and Chinese insiders (in Taiwan).
Besides, Taiwan is also interesting for the numerous cases of information manipulation that
have targeted the island, including the Jebi typhoon affair (2018), which caused the death of a
man, or the electoral interferences during the municipal elections in November 2018 first, and
later the presidential and legislative elections in January 2020. Furthermore, agriculture has long
been an important target for disinformation, and the example of a Chinese that pretended to
be a Taiwanese YouTuber showed that language is no longer a sufficient barrier to protect Tai-
wan from Chinese information manipulation operations. Li Jie (2019), the Covid-19 pandemic
(2020), and the bilateral diplomatic relation were additional examples. Finally, there is the case
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of the (permanent threat of) military might: the use of military drills for psychological warfare
against Taiwan is also one of the main levers of Chinese influence operations – and they have
increased in recent years.
In conclusion, the Chinese political war against Taiwan brought some tactical successes
inasmuch as it contributed to polarizing the Taiwanese society. But it was a strategic failure
and even a counterproductive policy: both incentives and punitive measures under Xi Jin-
ping did not produce the expected results. A majority of the population remains favorable
to the president and to the DPP and it has grown more distrustful of China. In fact, the
nationalist sentiment rises: the number of people that describe themselves as “solely Tai-
wanese” has never been higher (67%). The Hong Kong crisis was no stranger to this, having
acted as a powerful deterrent. And the government took a number of measures to combat
interference, especially Chinese interference, which should make influence operations more
difficult to conduct in the future. It also reinforced its determination to reduce the country’s
dependence on China, insisting on diversifying its economy – especially in the sectors used
as levers by Beijing (i.e. tourism). In general, the recent increased aggressiveness of China
against Taiwan, and against the rest of the world, has considerably boosted the attractive-
ness of the island. In a word, Chinese efforts to weaken and isolate Taiwan have had the
opposite effect.
Hong Kong demonstrators were targeted by informational operations in 2019, which
were also tied to Taiwan (the same recycled methods and content were apparently adapted:
on the one hand, the Hong Kong crisis helped structure the narratives against Taiwan; on the
other hand, China seemingly used its Taiwanese allies to intervene in Hong Kong). Most of
the time, it was political “spamming” meant to flood (local and international) public opinions
with doctored sensationalist content (i.e. comparing Hong Kong demonstrators to cock-
roaches or jihadist terrorists). To that end, they used social networks with an international
audience, such as TikTok (censored and instrumentalized by Chinese authorities), but also
Facebook and Twitter, both banned in China (but patriotic trolls are authorized and even
encouraged to “hop” over the “Great Firewall” that is supposed to prevent Chinese Internet
users from accessing the non-Chinese cyberspace). Twitter explained that it suppressed ap-
proximately 200,000 fake accounts part of a “coordinated state-backed operation” aimed at
“undermining the legitimacy and political positions of the protest movement.” The platform
also published the archives of the 936 most active accounts, all originating from the PRC.
The data showed that the campaign was launched hurriedly with two traditional types of ac-
counts, the “mercenary” (bought or stolen) and “dormant” accounts; they spread three main
narratives: a rejection of the demonstrators, support for the Hong Kong police, and con-
spiracy theories on the participation of “Westerners” in the protests. One of the main clues
to the “massive and coordinated” but also hurried nature of the disinformation campaign
could be found in the dates when the accounts were created: more than half were created
within three months. Our investigation also identified a series of dormant accounts that had
been reactivated, and relaying accounts (used to retweet and share content published by the
main accounts). Moreover, it confirmed that the two main arguments justifying the attacks
were the alleged violence of the protestors and their manipulation by “anti-Chinese foreign
forces.”
Finally, the Hong Kong example highlighted the importance of the (relatively) new “corps
of volunteers,” or “water armies,” usually used to artificially increase the popularity of a star or
product, but that can be refitted in times of crisis to conduct veritable campaigns of hatred. Two
of the most famous of these groups are Diba and Fanquan, and they conducted joint actions
against Hong Kong demonstrators.
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Singapore, which has an ambivalent relationship with China, a mixture of proximity and
defiance, has a number of particularities that makes it particularly vulnerable, but at the same
time particularly resistant, to Chinese influence. The city-state is structurally vulnerable due to its
size, hyperconnectivity, common use of both English and Chinese, its dependence on imports,
tense relation to Malaysia and, most importantly, because of the very multiethnic and inter-com-
munitarian nature of the Singaporean society. The country also has vulnerabilities specifically
attractive to China: a majority of its population has Chinese roots (74.5%), which encourages
Beijing to present Singapore as a “Chinese country.” Besides, the population is organized in
clan associations, faces heightened Chinese immigration and is economically attracted to China.
Finally, Beijing can rely on mediatic and individual relays, and on a similar approach to human
rights. In this context, Beijing’s goal is to “impose a Chinese identity onto Singapore,” to make
the city-state stop training its armed forces in Taiwan, stop speaking about freedom of naviga-
tion, and further increase its trade relations with China.
Several events are symptomatic of the Chinese influence in Singapore and played a part in
the rapidly rising awareness of the public: with the Terrex affair culminated a series of incidents
in the bilateral relation in 2016, and several spying scandals (including Huang Jing and Jun Wei
Yeo).
That said, Singapore is also particularly well-equipped to counter this pressure. Its defense
relies on the development of a counter-narrative on a unique national, multiethnic and multi-
cultural identity, and more specifically on a singular Chinese Singaporean identity. On the paper,
three-fourth of the inhabitants are “Chinese” but a large majority of them describe themselves
as Singaporean. The cultural penetration of China is weak. On the other hand, there is a grow-
ing awareness of the risks posed by Chinese influence, which is catalyzed by a personality like
Bilahari Kausikan, a former diplomat and secretary of state, who stated that China “uses a range
of tactics--from legitimate diplomacy to more covert and often illegal deployment of agents of
influence and operations--to sway decision makers or public opinion leaders.” He believes that
these operations against Singapore were intended “not just to direct behavior, but to condition
behavior. China does not just want you to comply with its wishes, it wants you to… do what it
wants without being told.” Singapore is therefore very aware of its vulnerabilities. Moreover, in
the field of combating information manipulation, Singapore is, along with Sweden, one of the
most advanced states in the world.
Sweden is a typical case of a “Machiavellian moment.” While the bilateral relationship
was developing and China’s image was quite good, the appointment of a new ambassador in
August 2017 – who became one of the precursors of the “wolf warrior” diplomats – altered
the situation. Indeed, the ambassador quickly multiplied offensive and threatening declara-
tions, against media outlets for instance. Some Swedish journalists have gone public about
becoming the victims of intimidation attempts from Chinese diplomats but also from diverse
organizations of Chinese students. This aggressive Chinese drift in Sweden had notable con-
sequences: the Chinese-Swedish relation has considerably deteriorated, Sweden closed all
its Confucius Institutes, rewrote its “Chinese strategy,” and the city of Goteborg cancelled
its twin-city program with Shanghai. Finally, Sweden banned all Chinese (Huawei and ZTE)
equipment from its ongoing 5G call for tender. Now, approximately 80% of Swedish citizens
view China negatively. This is a disastrous track record for the ambassador but what may
seem incomprehensible from the outside, because blatantly counter-productive, can be ex-
plained in the following way: the goal was to seduce the CCP, not Sweden. And the latter was
a good “testing ground” for this new strategy of wolf warrior diplomats for several reasons:
the perfect size (small enough not to become a threat, but large enough to be significant,
at the European-scale at least), a world champion of liberal and democratic values (which
criticized China’s record on human rights), a competitor in important economic sectors, and,
finally, a bilateral relation already irritated by a few stories (including the Gui Minhai scandal).
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With Sweden, Beijing sent a warning to other countries, especially in Europe. It was both
an opportunistic test and one of the symptoms of a broader trend that is now widespread
throughout the world.
Two affairs in particular were symptomatic of the lasting pressure Beijing exerts on Stock-
holm. On the one hand, there is the case of the Chinese tourists who were presumably vio-
lented by the Swedish police, an accusation instrumentalized by Chinese authorities to raise
accusations of human rights violations precisely when the Gui Minhai case reached its apex
and to develop a narrative presenting Sweden as a dangerous and decadent society. Soon af-
ter, a satirical Swedish TV show that drew inspiration from the accident provoked Beijing’s
ire (cyberattacks, harassment, intimidation). On the other hand, the case of Anna Lindstedt,
described as the “greatest diplomatic scandal in modern Sweden,” involved the Swedish am-
bassador in China (Anna Lindstedt) and the daughter of Gui Minhai. Overall, Beijing can
rely on numerous local relays in Sweden, such as associations affiliated to the UFWD or the
Schiller Institute.
Several elements in the Swedish case are symptomatic of a more widespread evolution, ac-
knowledged in the present report, toward a Russification of Chinese influence operations. Using
varied narratives focalized on accidents, criminality, immigration, negative stories about Sweden
to instill the image of a violent and unstable society is precisely what Russian outlets have been
doing for years. Likewise, we note a convergence of views on Sweden among Chinese and Rus-
sian authorities and the U.S. alt-right, accompanied by cooperation with Swedish radical move-
ments and parties. Even the choice of Gui Congyou as ambassador is less surprising that may be
thought at first sight: sent to Sweden, where Russia is particularly active, the Chinese ambassador
speaks Russian fluently and is a known expert on Russia. As such, this pro-Russian profile makes
sense if China means to get closer to Russia, learn from it, and even work with it on the infor-
mational operations that Moscow has long conducted in Sweden.
Canada has drawn Beijing’s interest for various reasons, none the least for its Chinese diaspo-
ra, which hosts a large number of proven or presumed dissidents. As in Australia, the Party-State
uses its entire repertoire of actions there. For a long time, and despite recurring CSIS alerts and
numerous cases published by the press, political resistance – in this case the propensity to see
Beijing as a partner rather than a threat – remained strong in Canada. Yet, people have begun to
awaken to the problem after 2018, due to several factors: the ripple effect of the Australian prec-
edent (the similarity between the two countries prompted comparison) and above all the Huawei
affair, i.e., the brutal deterioration of the bilateral relationship following the arrest in Canada
of Huawei’s Chief Financial Officer at the request of U.S. courts, to which Beijing immediately
responded by arresting two Canadians on its soil, without any justification (hostage diplomacy),
and by adopting trade sanctions.
One of the main goals for Chinese operations in Canada is to quiet dissidents. There are
many well-documented cases of harassment and intimidation of citizens and residents con-
sidered as dissidents or threats by Beijing. Beijing organizes (via WeChat usually) aggressive
counter-demonstrations, conducts harassment and intimidation campaigns against targeted
individuals, helped by fake accounts and doctored images, uses relatives and family mem-
bers who stayed in China as levers. Besides, the country constantly monitors certain com-
munities, most prominently ethnic minorities (including Uyghurs), conducts cyberattacks
against dissident groups and individuals, and usurps identities (attackers, for instance, sent
insulting emails to ministers and MPs pretending to be Falun Gong members to discredit
them). It also implements travel restrictions (Canadian activists were denied visas to China,
were arrested, detained, intimidated at Chinese airports, and forced to leave the country).
In any case, the goal remains the same: to censor dissenting voices. Beijing’s representatives
abroad, including its ambassador and consuls in Canada, are directly implicated in some
intimidation campaigns.
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Furthermore, Beijing also tries to influence:
- Canadian politics, by approaching and coopting certain politicians (some MPs and ministers
at the federal level but most prominently local politicians, in British Columbia and Ontario
especially, where the largest communities of Chinese live). There were a few cases of electoral
interference too: the Chinese consulate in Toronto sent Chinese students to Chinese-speaking
homes to tell voters whom to vote for, and the consulate in Vancouver is regularly accused of
endorsing candidates of Chinese descent in the Richmond district, where a Chinese organization
once incited voters – via WeChat – to vote for specific candidates in exchange for money.
- Media outlets: almost all Canadian outlets in Chinese are controlled by the CCP, and the
Party-State uses both the carrot (encouraging newspapers to censor themselves in exchange of
trade advantages) and the stick (intimidation, threats, harassment, pressures on relatives in China,
ousting journalists who resist pressure, closing dissenting programs) against them. There were
also cases of information manipulation, especially through doctored translations.
- The educational system: in the universities first, including some that are relatively dependent
on Chinese students (like in Australia, but less prominently). Two types of problems need to be
considered separately: on the one hand, Beijing uses Canadian university programs in science
and technology to spy and steal technologies; and Canadian academics take part to dozens of
research projects with Chinese military universities. On the other hand, Beijing uses Canadian
universities to political ends, monitoring what is being said on campuses and surveilling the
dissidents that speak up. Some organizations have adopted a near-military discipline, sometimes
raising the flag and singing the Chinese national anthem on Canadian campuses, where Chinese
students do not hide their nationalism. There is also evidence of the involvement of Chinese
authorities (embassies and consulates) on Canadian campuses, especially through student asso-
ciations (CSSAs). Then, secondary education has not been left untouched – with the opening
of Confucius Institutes especially. In that context, there are examples of restrictions of the
students’ freedom of speech, on topics tied to China: some teachers forbade discussions of the
Tian’anmen massacre and used maps that included Taiwan in China for instance.
Furthermore, there are cases of information manipulation, including forged letters sent on
behalf of the prime minister and minister of immigration in favor of a new “Tibetan” orga-
nization that was nothing but a façade used by Beijing to circulate its narrative on Tibet. Also,
WeChat is regularly criticized for its role in controlling persons and contents on campuses, or-
ganizing public counter-demonstrations, and in interfering with the electoral process. Chinese
services have used WeChat groups abroad to detect dissidents and harvest personal data. In one
case, the WeChat account of a Liberal minister was used against her will to collect money meant
to fund legal pursuits against a journalist critical of Beijing.
In Canada, the Party-State relies on hundreds of local organizations that are more or less af-
filiated to the UFWD (hence to the CCP). Each year, new organizations are created, in all areas
of life. Besides, Beijing is engaged in a strategy to seduce the First Nations, which may be used
to divide the Canadian society (with the narrative that “the two people must help each other to
fight marginalization and racism”). The example of the Musqueam, an autochthonous people
from the Vancouver region, is particularly interesting as some have Chinese ancestors. Hence,
Beijing’s efforts toward them are significant, but they are not the only targets.
Finally, as in the Swedish case, the Canadian example testifies to the Russification of Chi-
nese influence operations. First, the Party-State does not stop at shaping the national debate on
China, censoring dissidents, the press, interfering in schools and universities, and so on. It also
criticizes the Canadian society and its government to try to divide the population. It exploits
several potentially divisive topics to alienate the Chinese community from its host country and,
ultimately, convince them that they are closer to Beijing than to Ottawa. The Huawei scandal also
provided Beijing with the opportunity to stir tensions between Canada and the United States,
circulating the idea that, contrary to appearances, it was really a problem between Canada and
the United States, not Canada and China; that Canada found itself inadvertently in the middle of
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a Chinese-American cold war. Now, Chinese operations remain tied to the Chinese community
in Canada, but their progressive Russification indicates that they are increasingly “de-Sinicized,”
i.e. they have widened their reach from strictly communitarian questions to addressing societal
issues that affect all Canadians.
The last case study discussed the operation meant to redefine the coronavirus as U.S.-
made. The informational war launched by the CCP on the coronavirus had three components:
controlling the hemorrhage internally (emphasizing its efficient management of the crisis, and
flooding Chinese citizens with multiples, sometimes contradictory, counter-narratives); turning
the stigma over (demonetizing the critical voices heard in Western media and building a narra-
tive presenting China at the bedside of the world – even when it implied manipulating facts and
information, such as in Italy); and discrediting adversaries (blaming the sanitary crisis on other
countries, especially on the United States). There lied the operation we nicknamed “Infektion
2.0,” for its similitudes with the KGB’s Infektion Operation conducted during the 1980s to make
people believe that Americans had created the AIDS virus.
The Chinese operation was deployed considerably faster in 2020, in a month (four years for
its Soviet version, between 1983 and 1987 – a difference due to the virality of social networks).
Early on, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was involved, relaying the theory that the virus
originated in the United States, not in China. It drew on the Canadian website globalresearch.
ca (known for its active role in the “conspirasphere” and as a relay of Russian campaigns of
disinformation) and on the articles published by “Larry Romanoff,” a retired Canadian settled
in Shanghai.
Beijing’s motivations may have been diverse: diverting the attention of the Chinese popula-
tion to an evident scapegoat; then contributing indirectly to the perennity of the regime; helping
out the switch to a narrative that presented China as benevolent by disparaging the United States;
weakening the democratic model of governance by circulating the narrative of a “good” Chinese
management of the sanitary crisis, etc. This operation successfully confirmed the Russification/
sovietization of Chinese methods of disinformation as they followed, almost to the letter, the
steps of the KGB’s operations: a prompt reaction; a story so difficult to conceive that it could
only be true; based on enough truthful evidence to be believable; in which China’s role was hid-
den; with the help of some useful idiots. Lastly, like the Soviets, Beijing denied any involvement.
619
CONCLUSION
A MACHIAVELLIAN MOMENT
In the 17th chapter of The Prince (1532), Machiavel asked “whether it is better to be loved
than to be feared or the contrary,” to which he answered that “it is much safer to be feared
than to be loved.”1 This posture has most famously been associated with Russia – partic-
ularly with President Putin2 – rather than with China. For a long time, it was said that
China tried to be loved rather than to be feared: the country wanted to seduce, to proj-
ect a positive image of itself onto the world, and to provoke admiration. We did write, in an
article comparing China and Russia in January 2020, that “China is more preoccupied with
its moral image (respectability) on the international stage, being a good global citizen,” and
that it was, as such, “more reluctant to use certain methods potentially presenting a greater
reputational risk.” Russia, on the other hand, “not only cares less about its reputation (it
has less to offer but also less to lose), it actually cultivates the image of a strong state using
security and military with audacity”3 to denigrate its adversaries and impair their power of
attraction. This is at least the Russian interpretation of the soft power (мягкая сила).4 Now,
the difference between China and Russia has become thinner.
Obviously, China has not renounced its strategy of “seducing and subjugating”
(→ p. 147), its attractiveness, or its ambition to model international norms. The CCP
remains careful not to “lose face” (丢脸-丢面子) and to avoid damaging its image in many
domains. For that reason, the Chinese ethos has not become Russian. However, at the same
time, Beijing is more and more comfortable with “infiltrating and constraining”
(→ p. 161). Undeniably, as shown in the hundreds of pages in this report, its influence
operations have grown considerably tougher in recent years, and they have come to
resemble Moscow’s more and more closely. The reasons behind the aggressive turn of
Chinese diplomacy (which started before the Covid-19 pandemic) are revealing: ambassa-
dors are now primarily targeting Beijing, they are in a zealous race to win favors (→ p. 239).
For Beijing, defending the Party has become more important than winning the hearts
and minds of foreign populations which, in any case, are already constrained by China’s
1. Niccolò Machiavelli and Peter Bondanella, The Prince, Oxford World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2005), Chapter XVII, 57-8.
2. See, for instance, the June 2014 issue of La Revue des deux mondes dedicated to “Machiavelli or Putin.”
3. Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer and Paul Charon, “Russia as a Hurricane, China as Climate Change: Different
Ways of Informational Warfare,” War on the Rocks (21 Jan. 2020).
4. Maxime Audinet, “Un soft power d’État russe: la mâgkaâ sila,” (“A Russian State’s Soft Power: The mâGkaâ Sila”),
in J.-R. Raviot, ed., Russie: vers une nouvelle Guerre froide? (Russia: Toward Another Cold War?) (Paris: La Documentation
française, 2016), 150-173; Yulia Kiseleva, “Russia’s Soft Power Discourse: Identity, Status and the Attraction of Power,”
Politics, 35:3-4 (2015), 316-329; Vincent Charles Keating and Katarzyna Kaczmarska, “Conservative Soft Power: Liberal
Soft Power Bias and the ‘Hidden’ Attraction of Russia,” Journal of International Relations and Development (2017), 1-27. For
a comparison between the Chinese and Russian approaches to soft power, see: Jeanne L. Wilson, “Russia and China
Respond to Soft Power: Interpretation and Readaptation of a Western Construct,” Politics, 35:3-4 (2015), 287-300.
620
economic might. In other words, the CCP demonstrates a will to arouse not only admi-
ration, but also fear. And this is precisely for that reason, – because the Party now seems
convinced that “it is safer to be feared than to be loved” – that it can be said to have
entered, since 2017 or so, into a “Machiavellian moment”5, the main symptom of
which is the increasing Russification of Chinese operations.
I. The Russification of Chinese influence operations
Despite their common ideological matrix, significant skills transfers from the USSR
to Maoist China (at least until the early 1950s), and jointly-led operations,6 China’s
informational strategies have long remained different from its vast neighbor’s. For
instance, Beijing has always seemed to cherish its international image, which meant usu-
ally (but not always) opting for the diffusion of positive messages about itself – whereas
Moscow took on the image of the spoilsport, stirring up social, political, ethnic, or reli-
gious conflicts in targeted countries. Furthermore, Beijing’s operations mostly focused
on Chinese diasporas throughout the world whereas Russia had more general and diverse
targets. Finally, and that was the major difference for the past twenty years, the PRC’s
power allowed it to wield its influence without having to systematically use secret opera-
tions, while Russia’s endemic weakness renders the asymmetric weapon of informational
operations more necessary.
Yet, we suggested in January 20207 that a Russification of Chinese operations was
underway. It wasn’t a novel idea: the Russification of Chinese operations – or at least bor-
rowings from Russian tactics – has been discussed for years. A parallel was drawn, for
instance, during the 2018 municipal elections in Taiwan, which were targeted by “a
Russia-style influence campaign.”8 At the time, it already alerted some observers; in the
columns of The Washington Post, for instance, Josh Rogin wrote a premonitory assessment:
“the fact that Beijing is using Russian-style political interference tools should prompt a
full-scale national security alarm. The capabilities Beijing is honing in Taiwan could do
huge damage if applied to the United States. China is testing them on a country it knows
well but preparing for their use around the world.”9 Indeed, Beijing had tested tactics in its
regional environment before it began implementing them globally (→ p. 626), exactly what
Moscow had done a few years earlier. In 2019, this assessment was updated, and the
fears renewed, during the operations that targeted Hong Kong. And this is in 2020,
during the Covid-19 pandemic, that the world finally took notice of the problem.
Initially, Chinese media outlets covered the pandemic in a rather positive manner, in
that it highlighted Chinese efforts. Then, as Western countries were affected and China
increasingly blamed, they adopted a more offensive stance that integrated a negative cov-
5. Hence, our “Machiavellian moment” does not refer to the debate on the republican interpretation of Machiavelli
(on this: John Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Paris: PUF,
1975); Claude Lefort, Le travail de l’œuvre Machiavel (The Work on Machiavelli’s Writing) (Paris: Gallimard, 1986); Quentin
Skinner and Maurizio Viroli, eds., Machiavelli and Republicanism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990).
6. During the Korean War, for instance, (→ p. 633). See: Ricardo Barrios, “Virulent Rhetoric: Chinese State Claims
of US Biological Warfare from the Korean War to COVID-19,” Center for Advanced China Research (1 Apr. 2020).
7. Jeangène Vilmer and Charon, “Russia as a Hurricane, China as Climate Change.”
8. Chris Horton, “Specter of Meddling by Beijing Looms over Taiwan’s Elections,” The New York Times (22 Nov. 2018).
9. Josh Rogin, “China’s Interference in the 2018 Elections Succeeded – in Taiwan,” The Washington Post (18 Dec.
2018).
621
erage of the management of the crisis by other countries. Hence, comparing models, it
used the pandemic as an illustration of the apparently chaotic and inefficient democratic
model of government. While using different tactics (“from promoting conspiracy web-
sites to the use of trolls and bot networks to pushing false narratives couched in science
on Chinese state media”), “Beijing [engaged] in an aggressive information campaign
to try and reshape the global narrative around COVID. [It did] this in attempt to
make the world see China as the global leader in the response rather than the source of
the pandemic.”10
The tactics employed by the Chinese government in these successive episodes
– coordination between diplomats and state media, use of Western social networks, sys-
tematic attempt to discredit Western media, cooptation of conspiracy outlets, clandestine
operations on social networks etc. – led the ASPI to write that “the CCP’s propaganda
apparatus has been watching the tactics and impact of Russian disinformation.”11
The Global Engagement Center of the U.S. State Department noted the same thing: “we’re
seeing the CCP adopt Russian-style tactics.”12 And a growing number of publications from
all over the world have stressed it: the Russification of Chinese operations is now
widely recognized.
That said, discussing the “Russification” of Chinese operations does not imply that
there is one coherent and homogenous Russian approach. With Camille François, we
can regret that observers are too quick in recognizing a “Russian playbook” when it “is akin
to a Russian salad: not very Russian, and with different ingredients every time.”13 Russian
actors are actually diverse and not all tied to state structures; they experiment and adapt
themselves along the way, keeping and improving the recipes that worked. Ultimately, they
are certainly not the only ones using those tactics. And yet, these are often described and
investigated – rightly or wrongly – as being “Russians.”
Concretely, the Russification of Chinese operations accounts for three elements that
are described in the following pages: Beijing draws from Moscow in several ways, but
differences remain between them. Interestingly, there is also a degree of coopera-
tion.
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