INFORMATION WARAre Russia and China Teaming Up Against America in a Global Information War? Yes and No.
Are Russia and China coordinating information campaigns, or is their symbiotic relationship merely reflective of messaging opportunism and interest alignment? The Kremlin is the unquestioned leader in the dissemination of global propaganda and disinformation, both on traditional and social media channels. Much of Moscow’s approach has been adopted by Beijing, China is authoring its own authoritarian influence playbook backed by financial and technological resources that Russia simply cannot match.
The Kremlin and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as constant critics of the United States, naturally converge in the information space. The themes and narratives they disseminate about the United States and Western democracies show remarkable consistency—and, at times, appear synchronized. At the end of November 2021, for example, the two countries authored a joint statement challenging the U.S. Summit for Democracy. This trend begs the question: Are Russia and China coordinating information campaigns, or is their symbiotic relationship merely reflective of messaging opportunism and interest alignment?
The Kremlin is the unquestioned leader in the dissemination of global propaganda and disinformation, both on traditional and social media channels. Much of Moscow’s approach has been adopted by Beijing, in both message and method, but the CCP is not copying or borrowing the Kremlin’s playbook outright; China is authoring its own authoritarian influence playbook backed by financial and technological resources that Russia simply cannot match.
An examination of the two countries’ overt propaganda and covert social media influence operations reveals that Russia and China will surely cooperate in smearing the United States, while at the same time pursuing different strategies and long-term objectives in the information space. The two countries demonstrate many similarities in their propaganda and disinformation campaigns, both from a tactical and narrative perspective. Operationally, the Kremlin and CCP have both created a massive network of state-sponsored news outlets that are able to broadcast in many languages around the world. Russia, with RT and Sputnik News, and China, with CTGN, Xinhua, CCTV, and other networks, have created systems of content production that reach millions around the world each day. State-owned propaganda from both countries highlights violence, unrest, and disorder within the United States as a means to criticize Western democracy and the United States’ role on the world stage and to promote their own systems of governance in the process. State media personnel and government officials from both countries also often post misleading or false information targeting the United States.
