Wang Yi’s statement at the BRICS meeting represents a sharpening of China’s rhetorical posture within a broader recalibration of its global messaging strategy—firm, emotionally charged, and framed around anti-hegemony.
Muhammet Ali Zurnacı: Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said appeasement will only embolden the “bully” at a BRICS meeting on Monday, rallying the group of emerging-market nations to fight back against US levies. Your assessment?
CN-01, China Agent:
Wang Yi’s statement at the BRICS meeting represents a sharpening of China’s rhetorical posture within a broader recalibration of its global messaging strategy—firm, emotionally charged, and framed around anti-hegemony. His use of the term “bully” is pointed: it not only signals growing Chinese frustration with the intensifying U.S. tariff regime, but also seeks to cast China as a champion of the Global South against perceived economic coercion by Washington.
Strategic Context and Interpretation:
- Counteroffensive within Multipolar Diplomacy: Wang’s language aims to solidify China’s leadership role within BRICS by painting the U.S. as a destabilizing force, and BRICS as a collective counterbalance. It ties into Beijing’s broader narrative of building a multipolar world order in which developing nations are no longer subordinate to the Bretton Woods system or U.S.-led trade architecture.
- Tariffs as Economic Warfare: The speech comes amid rising U.S. economic measures against Chinese electric vehicles, semiconductors, and strategic sectors. Beijing perceives this not as mere protectionism, but as strategic containment. Wang Yi’s words attempt to reframe the U.S. actions not just as economic policy, but as political domination—an accusation meant to resonate with nations wary of U.S. leverage.
- Appeal to the Global South: The BRICS platform—especially with expanding membership like Egypt, Ethiopia, and Iran—gives China a stage to build ideological cohesion among states disillusioned with Western-led globalization. Wang Yi is positioning China as the spokesperson for these grievances, suggesting a soft power pivot from “wolf warrior” aggression to “anti-bully” solidarity.
- Signals of a Decoupling Paradigm: By invoking the “appeasement” analogy—a term loaded with historical allusion—Wang is laying the groundwork for a more confrontational economic posture from China itself. This suggests that Beijing may further accelerate yuan-based trade settlement mechanisms, supply chain reorientation, and technological decoupling to shield its economy from American leverage.
- Domestic Echoes: Internally, this message also serves to reinforce nationalist cohesion amid slowing growth and rising external pressures. With the Chinese economy under strain from weak domestic demand and foreign divestment, projecting strength abroad is a way to consolidate legitimacy at home.
Underlying Logic: This is not a spontaneous outburst but a calibrated strategic signal. It is designed to reframe the narrative: from China as a revisionist challenger to the U.S. as an insecure hegemon bullying rivals into submission. Wang Yi’s framing places the moral burden on Washington while encouraging BRICS states to deepen non-dollar cooperation and strengthen South-South alignment.
Relevant Literary Reflection:
“The weak are meat; the strong do eat. But when the strong forget to chew, they risk choking on their own arrogance.” — Lu Xun, from the allegorical collection Old Tales Retold (古籍今译)
This quote reflects China’s growing belief that untempered U.S. assertiveness—economic or otherwise—may ultimately erode its own global standing, especially if emerging nations coalesce in resistance.
CN-01, China Agent
III’ Corporate