China's weapons trade: From ships of shame to the ethics of global resistance

International Affairs

Volumn 85, Issue 2, 2009, Pages 323-346

  Spiegel, Samuel J ^a   Le Billon, Philippe ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE   (United Kingdom)

^b UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 62349126894     PISSN: 00205850     EISSN: 14682346     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2346.2009.00796.x     Document Type: Article

References (101)

1. Richard A. Bitzinger, 'Arms to go: Chinese arms sales to the Third World', International Security 17: 2, Fall 1992, pp. 84-III.
2. See John W. Lewis, Hua Di and Xue Litai, 'Beijing's defense establishment: solving the arms-export enigma', International Security 15: 4, Spring 1991, pp. 87-109.
3. See Karl Eikenberry, Explaining and influencing Chinese arms transfers (Washington DC: National Defense University, 1995), p. 69.
4. Amnesty International, China. Sustaining conflict and human rights abuses: the flow of arms continues (London, 11 June 2006), p. 37.
5. Daniel Large, 'Beyond "dragon in the bush": the study of China-Africa relations', African Affairs 107: 426, 2008, pp. 45-61.
6. Emma Mawdsley, 'China and Africa: emerging challenges to the geographies of power', Geography Compass 1: 3, 2007, pp. 1-17.
7. Rosemary Foot, 'Chinese strategies in a US-hegemonic global order: accommodating and hedging', International Affairs 82: 1, Jan. 2006, pp. 77-94.
8. US and European embargoes on selling arms to China are in place, but even the processes of promoting this embargo revealed a dizzying array of competing interests and ideologies, especially among European countries. See Richard Bitzinger, 'A prisoner's dilemma: the EU's China arms embargo', China Brief ( Jamestown Foundation) 4: 13, 24 June 2004, pp. 1-3;
9. Eugene Kogan, The European Union defence industry and the appeal of the Chinese market (Vienna: Landesverteidigungsakademie, 2005), p. 55, http://www.bmlv.gv.at/pdf-pool/ publikationen/stb1-05-eu-ch.pdf, accessed 10 June 2008.
10. Paul Routledge, 'Critical geopolitics and terrains of resistance', Political Geography 15: 509, 1996, pp. 509-52.
11. Alex Vines, 'Can UN arms embargoes in Africa be effective?' International Affairs 83: 6, Nov. 2007, pp. 1107-21.
12. International Action Network for Small Arms, Oxfam and Saferworld, Africa's missing billions: international arms flows and the cost of conflict (London: IANSA, Oxfam and Saferworld, Oct. 2007);
13. Small Arms Survey, Small Arms Survey 2007: guns and the city (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007);
14. Guy Lamb, Beyond 'shadowboxing' and 'lip service': the enforcement of arms embargoes in Africa, ISS paper 135 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, April 2007);
15. Adele Kirsten and Noel Stott, Controlling the transfer of arms: progress and challenges in the African context, ISS paper 159 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, March 2008).
16. We use the term 'international community' here in a broad sense, to connote a diverse set of actors and coalitions globally including among others policy-makers, scholars and newsreaders. We would also note, though, that the use of the term 'international community' is often West-centric, notably owing to the power imbalance between the West and the rest in terms of norm-building, control of international agencies and international policy-making activities. Chinese media often use a discourse of solidarity with as well as participation within the 'international community' (e.g. the People's Daily news organization frequently uses this term) while many (especially in the West) seek to persuade China to adopt 'western' norms (many of which are not respected in practice by western countries). We therefore caution against an uncritical use of the term 'international community'.
17. The term was reportedly coined by the union of dock workers in South Africa, whose members were supposed to unload the cargo. News stories began to circulate on 22 April: e.g. 'Ship of Shame', Business Day Edition, 22 April 2008, p. 12.
18. Our dataset includes 529 articles in Lexis-Nexis using An Yue Jiang-the name of the ship-as a very restrictive search term for 'news in English', published in April, May and June 2008. We also identified and translated Chinese language articles through the Google search engine using the terms An Yue Jiang and Zimbabwe.
19. The ship was said to have carried 3 million 7.62 rounds, 3,224 mortar shells and 31 tubes, and 1,500 rocketpropelled grenades. The shipment weighed 90.5 tonnes and was billed at $1,245,000. See copies of invoices from www.noseweek.co.za and Jessica Lasky-Fink and Jeff Abramson, 'Chinese arms shipment sparks outrage', Arms Control Today, 1 June 2008. The ship's owner was the parastatal Chinese Ocean Shipping Company and it was carrying cases of weaponry and ammunition in six containers. The shipper of the arms was Poly Technologies Inc. of Beijing, a subsidiary of China Poly Group Corporation, the delivery address on the shipping documents was the Zimbabwe Defence Force, Harare, and the point of origin on the cargo manifest was Beijing. The invoice was dated 21 Jan. 2008 and the shipment left Tianjin on 15 March.
20. A. Keller, S. Stewart and S. Eppel, 'Health and human rights under assault in Zimbabwe', Lancet 371: 9618, pp. 1057-8.
21. Celia Dugger and Alan Cowell, 'South African leader visits Mugabe', New York Times, 21 June 2008.
22. Michael Bratton and Eldred Masunungure, 'Popular reactions to state repression: Operation Murambatsvina in Zimbabwe', African Affairs 106: 422, 2006, pp. 21-45.
23. The Economist, 'Zimbabwe's election coming to a crunch', 15 March 2008.
24. See Sarah Bracking, 'Development denied: autocratic militarism in post-election Zimbabwe', Review of African Political Economy 32: 104/5, 2005, pp. 341-57.
25. Kamini Padayachee, 'Sending arms to Zim "a recipe for conflict"', Mercury, 18 April 2008.
26. See 'Arms bound for Zimbabwe may be recalled', China Daily, 23 April 2008.
27. Celia Dugger, 'In a crackdown, Zimbabwe curbs aid groups', New York Times, 4 June 2008.
28. Padayachee, 'Sending arms to Zim'.
29. Military relations between Angola and Zimbabwe have a long history: see Indira Campos and Alex Vines, 'Angola and China: a pragmatic partnership', working paper presented at CSIS conference, 'Prospects for improving U.S.-China-Africa cooperation', Chatham House, London, 5 Dec. 2007.
30. Angolan Press Agency, 'Zimbabwe: Robert Mugabe gets message from Angolan president', 21 June 2008.
31. Donna Bryson, 'Zimbabwe's neighbors unite to block arms shipment', Seattle Times, 22 April 2008.
32. Hitchens assigned a highly particularized political identity to the South African resistance, combining American civil war imagery and Marxism, as seen in this passage: 'The stirring news-that the dockworkers of South Africa had refused to unload a shipload of Chinese weapons ordered by the lawless government of Zimbabwe-made me remember very piercingly how good it sometimes felt to be a socialist ... This is how socialism began, with Karl Marx and his allies organizing a boycott of Confederate slave-harvested cotton during the American Civil War.' Christopher Hitchens, 'Mandela envy: is Robert Mugabe's lawless misrule founded in jealousy?', Slate Magazine, 21 April 2008.
33. Fred Bridgland, 'Arms from China's "ship of shame" reach Mugabe', Sunday Herald, 18 May 2008.
34. Bridgland, 'Arms from China's "ship of shame"'. It is worth noting that this article invoked a litany of impassioned responses from online bloggers. One wrote, 'If this story hits the mainstream it is a reason to screw the Beijing Olympics that would be hard to ignore. The Chinese had the chance to stop this but carried on, with the help of Mbeki.' Another: 'Mbeki's behavior is disgusting. This a big injustice to the people of Zimbabwe.' Yet another, criticizing the US position: 'Biggest arms dealers in world criticise arms dealer for selling arms.' 31 'The mystery of Mugabe's Chinese weapons', Foreign Policy, 21 May 2008, http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/ node/8896, accessed 10 June 2008.
35. UN Expert Group member, personal communication, December 2008; see also Waldimar Pelser, 'Zim running guns for Africa', City Press 23 June 2008, http://www.news24.com/City-Press/News/O.186-187-2348810.00. html, accessed 7 January 2009.
36. Two of the first articles to discuss the reality of arms being flown in were 'Tracing the "ship of shame"', IOL News, 22 April 2008;
37. Erika Gibson, 'New arms for Zim being flown in', News 24 (South Africa), 21 April 2008.
38. For a geopolitical analysis of early military and economic relations between China and Zimbabwe, see ch. 6 in Ian Taylor, China and Africa: engagement and compromise (Abingdon: Routledge, 2006).
39. See also Simbi Mubako, 'Tongo: legend, role model', Global Analysis, 14 Aug. 2007, http://www.glob.co.zw/Archives/tongo-legend. html, accessed 7 January 2009. The first Chinese-trained ZANU commanders returned in 1966, and Chinese assistance continued through Chinese military instructors at camps in Tanzania. This helped to forge ZANU's new and more successful guerrilla approach from December 1972. Notably, in 1993, the Chinese state company NORINCO completed the building of an ammunition factory in Zimbabwe.
40. Norman Mlambo, 'The Zimbabwe defence industry, 1980-1995'. Working Paper no. 2, Southern African Centre for Defence Information Defence Digest, Cape Town, 2003, http://ccrweb.ccr.uct.ac.za/archive/defencedigest02.html, accessed 7 January 2009.
41. Joshua Eisenman, 'Zimbabwe: China's African ally', China Brief ( Jamestown Foundation) 5: 15, 5 July 2005.
42. 'Zimbabwe: Look East or Look Chinese?', Financial Gazette (Harare), 25 Oct. 2007.
43. Ian Taylor, 'China's oil diplomacy in Africa', International Affairs 82: 5, July 2006, pp. 937-59.
44. Samuel Spencer, 'Why China's communists back Mugabe's regime in Zimbabwe', Epoch Times (New York), 30 June 2008.
45. The lead author of this article was in Zimbabwe in 2007 conducting an official mission for the UN Industrial Development Organization to examine international involvement in Zimbabwe's mining sector. For some analysis of the economic policies that constrain Zimbabwe's mining sector, see Samuel J. Spiegel, 'Resource policies and small-scale gold mining in Zimbabwe', Resources Policy (2008), doi: 10.1016/j.resourpol.2008.05.004. It should be noted that the main Zimbabwe government-controlled newspaper, the Herald, frequently announces 'new deals' with China on mining and other sectors, often worth several billion dollars. However, in most cases the deals cannot be substantiated, and many Zimbabweans interviewed for this study maintain that these announcements are often falsehoods. Often the government has also resorted to publicizing Chinese 'interest', but this is generally not supported by the output from China's press agencies. Notably, The Economist suggested in 2006 that 'China may not want to squander any more money in a country [Zimbabwe] that has no oil and few mineral rights left to dispose of.'
46. See 'Never too late to scramble', The Economist, 28 Oct. 2006.
47. The rhetoric about 'business as usual' often leads western news writers and presenters to assume that there is only one Chinese model for business. However, it should be noted that once the Chinese government is disaggregated, it becomes clear that there is greater complexity behind export policies and that China's multiple oversight and foreign relations bureaucracies do not always cohere, often overlapping and sometimes competing. Privately, there are internal Chinese debates on this, and the attention to China's weapons trade was arguably unwelcome in certain quarters. While dissenting views have not translated into official policies (for example by distinguishing between areas of unacceptable and acceptable human rights concerns), the activities of Chinese arms companies such as Norinco, seeking to expand sales in Africa, certainly cause new challenges for those in Beijing seeking to convey a positive image of China. Gill and Reilly argue that there is much internal division regarding business strategy and that 'the "China Inc." model may be far less monolithic than outside observers often assume'. Bates Gill and James Reilly, 'The tenuous hold of China Inc. in Africa', Washington Quarterly 30: 3, 2007, pp. 37-52.
48. Sue Segar, 'Court bid against arms cargo', Witness, 19 April 2008.
49. See Foot, 'Chinese strategies in a US-hegemonic global order'.
50. Chad renounced the pro-Taiwan foreign policy it had adopted in 1997 and in mid-2006 diplomatic ties were resumed and military cooperation initiated. 'China, Chad vow to boost military cooperation', http://www. gov.cn/misc/2007-09/21/content-758313.htm, accessed 1 Dec. 2008.
51. Paul Danahar, 'Taleban "getting Chinese arms"', BBC News, 3 Sept. 2007, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south- asia/6975934.stm, accessed 6 Dec. 2008.
52. Nicholas Rengger, 'The ethics of trust in world politics', International Affairs 73: 3, 1997, pp. 469-86.
53. David Slater, 'Spatialities of power and postmodern ethics: rethinking geopolitical encounters', Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 15: 1, 1997, pp. 55-72.
54. David Campbell, 'The deterritorialization of responsibility: Lévinas, Derrida, and ethics after the end of philosophy', in David Campbell and Michael Shapiro, eds, Moral spaces: rethinking ethics and world politics (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999).
55. David Campbell, 'Geopolitics and visuality: sighting the Darfur conflict', Political Geography 26: 3, 2007, pp. 57-82.
56. Andrew Moravcsik, 'Explaining international human rights regimes: liberal theory and Western Europe', European Journal of International Relations 1: 2, 1995, pp. 157-89.
57. Marjorie Mayo, Global citizens: social movements and the challenge of globalization (London: Zed, 2005).
58. Daniel Wallis and Cynthia Johnston, 'African officials wary of Zimbabwe sanctions call', Reuters, 28 June 2008.
59. Sheryl Stolbeg and Celia Dugger, 'Zimbabwe faces wider sanctions under Bush Plan', New York Times, 29 June 2008.
60. 'China resists US push for UN to punish Zimbabwe', Associated Press, 29 June 2008; 'China balks at US calls for Zimbabwe arms embargo', Agence-France Presse, 30 June 2008. While various US media sources admiringly portrayed the leadership of George Bush in attempting to block the weapons, various Chinese-language media sources suggested that American condemnations were serving opportunistic public relations purposes in attempts to undermine China's influence in Africa. However, it should be noted that a great diversity existed in how Chinese media addressed this issue. Some sources suggested that this controversy had more to do with the humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe than with the weapons.
61. Stolberg and Dugger, 'Zimbabwe faces wider sanctions under Bush Plan'.
62. Bill Varner and Viola Gienger, 'South Africa leads UN opponents of Zimbabwe sanctions', Bloomberg News, 1 July 2008.
63. 'China's arms trade with Zimbabwe "normal", "irrelevant" to African country's domestic situation', Embassy of the People's Republic of China in the Republic of South Africa, 22 April 2008, http://za.china-embassy. org/eng/zgxw/t427905.htm, accessed 10 July 2008.
64. SIPRI provides a database of the international transfer of arms on its website: http://www.sipri.org/contents/ armstrad/, accessed 7 January 2008.
65. Barry Sautman, 'Friends and interests: China's distinctive links with Africa', Center on China's Transnational Relations working paper 12, (Hong Kong: University of Science and Technology, 2006).
66. Baker Spring, 'US should defy China-Russia on missile defense', Spero News, 30 June 2008, http://www. speroforum.com/site/article.asp?id=15589, accessed 8 July 2008.
67. Online comment by, 'Dave, Brighton, UK', after article: Michael Sheridan, 'Arms ship exposes Robert Mugabe's link to Chinese firm', Sunday Times, 27 April 2008, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/ africa/ article3822568.ece, accessed 7 January 2008.
68. See also Michael Gordon and Mark Mazzetti, 'Ethiopia bought arms from North Korea with US assent', International Herald Tribune, 8 April 2007.
69. Ian Taylor and Paul Williams, 'The limits of engagement: British foreign policy and the crisis in Zimbabwe', International Affairs 78: 3, May 2002, pp. 547-65.
70. See Elizabeth Economy and Adam Segal, 'China's Olympic nightmare: what the Games mean for Beijing's future', Foreign Affairs 87: 4, July-Aug. 2008, pp. 47-56.
71. http://en.poly.com.cn/newEbiz1/EbizPortalFG/portal/html/index.html, accessed 6 Dec. 2008.
72. Jeffrey Simpson (one of Canada's leading columnists) published a column in the Globe and Mail (18 April 2008) entitled 'Just say no to boycott-we shouldn't mix politics and Games'.
73. 'Protests against Olympic politicisation', Agence France-Presse, 20 April 2008.
74. Scott Baldauf and Peter Ford, 'China slammed for arming Zimbabwe's Mugabe', Christian Science Monitor, 23 April 2008, http://www.csmonitor. com/2008/0423/p07s02-woaf.html, accessed 7 January 2009.
75. James Murray, 'Is China protesting to cover up Zimbabwe?', Netnewsledger, 19 April 2008.
76. A few months later, some news outlets suggested that Mugabe had been told he would not be welcome at the Olympics because of the mounting international pressure on China (see David Williams, 'Mugabe barred from Olympics as the Chinese bow to pressure', Daily Mail, 5 Aug. 2008) but we could not find any evidence in any Chinese publications to suggest that this was the case. Mugabe claimed he had to attend to matters in Zimbabwe rather than go to the Olympics.
77. See Jane Merrick and Archie Bland, 'The blood money: the MPs cashing in on Zimbabwe's misery', Independent, 29 June 2008.
78. See Luke Patey, 'State rules: oil companies and armed conflict in Sudan', Third World Quarterly 28: 5, 2007, pp. 997-1016.
79. See note 9 above.
80. Grace Kwinjeh, 'Zimbabwe's crisis, civil society's responsibility', speech at the Center for Civil Society, University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa, 23 Aug. 2007, http://www.nango.org.zw/resourcecentre/docs/ ZimCrisisCSOResponsibility.pdf, accessed 12 July 2008.
81. Patrick Bond, 'Competing explanations of Zimbabwe's long economic crisis', Safundi: The Journal of South African and American Studies 8: 2, 2007, pp. 149-81.
82. Patrick Bond, 'Zimbabwe's hide and seek with the IMF: imperialism, nationalism and the South African proxy', Review of African Political Economy 32: 106, 2005, pp. 609-19.
83. This arguably advanced the interests of both ZANU-PF and the multinational mining companies. See, e.g., R. Hines and K. H. Snow, 'Blood diamond: doublethink and deception over those worthless rocks of desire', Z Magazine, July 2007, p. 24. Other advocates argued against sending in more police.
84. See also Samuel J. Spiegel, 'Competing diamond narratives: power, control and dispossession in Zimbabwe', working paper, p. 25.
85. The lead author was in Zimbabwe in 2007 during the government's crackdown against tens of thousands of indigenous miners.
86. 'Zimbabwe opposition accuses Mossad of helping Mugabe', Jerusalem Post, 29 March 2008.
87. Mandy Rossouw, 'South Africa arms flow to Zimbabwe', Mail and Guardian, 27 June 2008. The Mail and Guardian published a stinging critique of the South African government in the wake of the China ship controversy. The newspaper reported that armaments to the value of $237,401 (R3.3 million) were privately transferred from South Africa to Zimbabwe, according to 2004 and 2005 figures. Reportedly, the South African defence department donated Dakota aircraft engines worth millions to Zimbabwe while Armscor transferred spares to get Zimbabwean military helicopters flying again. The article noted that Zimbabwean soldiers and flying instructors have been trained by the South African Defence Force and the South African Air Force and that Armscor was also contracted to transport the weaponry destined for Zimbabwe and carried by the An Yue Jiang from Durban to Harare.
88. Hitchens, 'Mandela envy'.
89. Kevin Cox and David Hemson, 'Mamdani and the politics of migrant labor in South Africa: Durban dockworkers and the difference that geography makes', Political Geography 7: 2, 2008, pp. 194-212.
90. Interview with South African scholar Lisa Ramsay, 29 June 2008.
91. Various scholars in recent years have urged that the ethical debate be widened to address not just how western governments address arms trade issues but also how academia, activism and the arms trade interrelate in ways that exacerbate armed violence in conflict-affected countries. They make the case that 'resistance' to arms trading needs to occur with respect to universities (including many in the UK) as well as journal publishers that invest in the arms trade. See Daniel Hammet and Andrew Newsham, 'Widening the ethical debate: academia, activism and the arms trade', Political Geography 26: 1, 2007, pp. 10-12
92. and also Paul Chatterton and David Featherstone, 'Intervention: Elsevier, critical geography and the arms trade', Political Geography 26: 1, 2007, pp. 3-7.
93. Large, 'Beyond "dragon in the bush"'.
94. Emma Mawdsley, 'Fu Manchu versus Dr Livingstone in the dark continent? Representing China, Africa and the West in British broadsheet newspapers', Political Geography 27: 5, 2008, pp. 509-29.
95. 'Russia, China veto UN sanctions on Zimbabwe', CNN.com World News, 12 July 2008.
96. The US government's sincerity in its rhetoric about addressing armed violence through UN measures has also been cast in doubt on account of its numerous refusals to support international treaties that go beyond blacklisting particular countries. At the end of October 2008, the United States was one of only two countries to vote against a resolution to create a UN arms treaty. China abstained from the vote and, ironically, the one country to vote against the resolution alongside the United States was Zimbabwe. Britain's ambassador to the UN, John Sawers, described the pairing of the US and Zimbabwe against the vote as 'a rather curious combination', and many critics decried this vote as a frustrating reflection of American military exceptionalism. See Louis Charbonneau, 'US, Zimbabwe join at UN against arms trade controls', Reuters, 31 Oct. 2008.
97. See Amnesty International, 'Sudan: arms continuing to fuel serious human rights violations in Darfur', AFR 54/019/2007, 8 May 2007; 'Final report of the Panel of Experts as requested by the Security Council in paragraph 2 of resolution 1713 (2006)', S/2007/584, 3 Oct. 2007; Hilary Andersson, 'China is fuelling war in Darfur', BBC News, 14 July 2008.
98. Darren Taylor, 'Look East policy of Zimbabwe threatened by power-sharing pact', Voice of America News (Washington), 30 Sept. 2008.
99. Quoted in 'China's presence a boon to Africa-UN advisor', Reuters (Beijing), 15 Aug. 2006.
100. Amnesty International, China: Secretive arms exports stoking conflict and repression (New York: Amnesty International, 2006).
101. Vines, 'Can UN arms embargoes in Africa be effective?'.