Provocation was the point – then, and now.
In the years leading up to the pandemic, senior diplomats and foreign ministry officials from China began to adopt a pugnacious and overtly nationalist tone to official statements, media comments and social media posts. This muscular and decidedly undiplomatic stance, which leaned into acerbic language and deliberately sought to provoke in style and content and phrasing, came to be known as “wolf warrior” diplomacy.
The label comes from a 2015 Chinese film of that name, an action movie dripping in nationalist sentimentality and muscularity akin to the Rambo film franchise from the 1980s.
This style of diplomacy was known for a number of particular traits. The most visible was its confrontational, aggressive and nationalistic tone and content. Some typical examples include the declaration in 2019 from PRC ambassador to Sweden, Gui Congyu, that “We treat our friends with fine wine, but for our enemies we have shotguns" and Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian tweeting an artist’s rendition of an Afghan child having its throat cut by an Australian soldier in 2020.
The response to the incidents was predictable outrage. Western commentators mostly saw the communication style as self-defeating. This, they said, will only reinforce our position as people see China for the bully it is.
Beyond the atmospherics, however, “wolf warrior” diplomacy was an effort to deliberately ruffle feathers. It was not just that officials from the People’s Republic of China were playing up to a highly nationalistic very-online audience, the provocation was the point. It was a way of positioning the PRC as a powerful player unconcerned with the niceties of diplomatic protocol and the soothing of its antagonists’ anxieties.
And unlike most forms of diplomacy, it was directed as much for domestic consumption as it was for foreign audiences. In particular, it was focused on demonstrating to Chinese audiences, and especially to President Xi Jinping, that China’s foreign representatives were standing up and representing a confident and strong PRC.
As US Vice President JD Vance let fly at Europe’s security elites in Munich over the weekend, it was hard to avoid the conclusion that he was embodying wolf warrior diplomacy, albeit inflected with MAGA characteristics.
Most obviously, like the PRC officials, Vance deliberately aimed to get under his audience’s skin. His speech lacked meaningful content of the kind that the Munich Security Conference is famous, instead relying on distracting barbs about Romanian elections and abortion in the United Kingdom. Provocation was the point. He knew full well that the tribune to a president who had sought to subvert an election in 2020 lecturing Europeans about democracy and values would inflame and anger – and he precisely hit the mark.
And like the PRC wolf warriors, his message was as much intended for domestic consumption. This was in part about ensuring that Fox News and online platforms would have grabs of MAGA messaging being broadcast on the global stage, as well as, of course, beaming directly to Donald Trump who had, it must be remembered, refused to endorse Vance as his successor in an interview the previous week.
Domestic politics has always played a major role in US foreign policy. But as long as US and European politics rested on domestic foundations that shared a common liberal outlook, the gaps between the two sides of the Atlantic could be managed. Now, Vance has made clear that the gap is not just cavernous, it is a source of overt hostility. Wolf warriors don’t agree with their targets, they provoke so as to make clear the difference between friend and enemy. Vance did exactly that.
At one level, Vance’s speech had little substantive content in terms of US strategic policy, its defence orientation or other matters. His personal influence on policy is unclear and his proximity to Trump as the decision-maker similarly uncertain. There’s a temptation to take Vance’s speech neither literally nor seriously.
That would be a mistake. Vance had a serious message in his provocation, that lay not in the words he spoke but in the signal of muscularity, the _expression_ of raw power. America does not care about values, it has no interest in the appearance of decorum. Europeans need to act in ways that the MAGA crowd approves of, or they will need to find some other way of defending themselves. It is a very different world now.