EDITORIAL: Beware Beijing’s expanding lawfare

China’s revised National Defense Mobilization Law took effect on Oct. 1, allowing the government to mobilize civilians and redirect resources for military purposes, and ensures a rapid transition from peacetime to wartime. It has a wide scope of “national interests” pretexts, which would likely be used against Taiwan.

The amendment incorporates Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) “Military-Civil Fusion” principle into law, and stipulates that once the state initiates national defense mobilization, “the people’s governments at or above the county level may expropriate and requisition civilian resources,” and “all organizations and individuals shall have the obligation to accept the lawful expropriation and requisition of civilian resources.” It massively expands China’s national mobilization, including drafting men aged 18 to 60 and women aged 18 to 55 into the armed forces, and allows it to legally and forcibly seize private property.

Given that most top Chinese political officials and military commanders have been purged under Xi’s corruption crackdown, the revised law was widely seen as a legislation to further consolidate Xi and his ruling clique’s control of public and civilian forces, paving the way for his five-year term or even to extend his leadership indefinitely.

As the new law aims to convert all peacetime resources, including energy, media and cutting-edge technologies, such as drones and artificial intelligence, into wartime supplies under government control, Taiwanese and international firms and assets in China could also be targeted. All cross-strait and cross-border business cooperation, supply chains, data flows and personnel could be incorporated into China’s national mobilization system, transforming them from commercial assets into warfare resources. Taiwan and other democracies should be vigilant and ensure Beijing is not using the law to expand its war preparations from just the military to the entire society.

The law has turned Xi’s aggressive and expansionary foreign policies into national legislation. While most countries’ military and social mobilization primarily focuses on crisis response, China’s law states that mobilization can take place if the nation’s sovereignty, unification, territorial integrity, security or development interests are threatened. This is the first time “unification” and “development interests” have been included in China’s legal framework for mobilization. The law also expands the discretionary power of the Chinese Communist Party, its government and military over what constitutes a threat.

The legislation could be used as “legal warfare” against Taiwan; Beijing could define an invasion of the nation as a “unification” mission to be safeguarded through defense mobilization. For example, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army could mobilize more civilian forces in its “gray zone” operations, cognitive warfare, cross-border repression or even a military conflict against Taiwan.

China could also use the law to send political signals, putting pressure on countries along the First Island Chain — including Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines — as well as Australia, the US and the EU.

American Foreign Policy Council Asian security senior fellow Larry Wortzel warned that “the wording of the legislation suggests a scope that is larger still,” as Beijing could invoke the law under the pretext of national development interests. It could mobilize warfare actions if it believes areas it “controls” — such as the South China Sea, East China Sea, or islands and territorial borders in dispute with other countries — are being threatened, or even just to secure overseas economic investments or foreign interests.

As Beijing strengthens its peacetime-wartime transition capabilities through legal and institutional adjustments, Taiwan must accelerate the enhancement of its national resilience and countermeasure capabilities. As a democratic country, it must consider how to integrate public and private “social powers” into collective “national resilience” based on democratic constitutionalism, cross-sectoral collaboration and social trust.

Dennis Blair, former US director of national intelligence and a retired commander of US forces in the Pacific, has praised the transformation of the annual Han Kuang military drill into a whole-of-society defense exercise, calling it a “great decision.” People and parties in Taiwan need to transcend political divisions, promote more social cooperation and shared determination to safeguard the security and sustainability of the nation.

Faced with China’s legalization of “military-civil fusion” for “national development interests,” which could pose a profound threat to regional stability and international order, democratic countries must foster more and stronger multilateral alliances to jointly counter Beijing’s aggression, and safeguard global democratic rules and peace.