Opinion | South China Sea: stakes are too high for China to use Wolf Warrior diplomacy in Southeast Asia

The Chinese ambassador to France’s recent remarks on French television about US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Taiwan visit has reaffirmed that Beijing’s controversial Wolf Warrior diplomacy will remain a feature when dealing with the West. However, Beijing should be wary of applying the same diplomatic approach to Asean countries, some of which have territorial disputes with China.

Members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, who often do not see eye to eye on foreign policy because of competing interests, have been unified in calling for “maximum restraint” in the Taiwan Strait, fearing they could be next in line for Chinese military threats if the situation was to escalate.

From Chinese officials promoting Covid-19 conspiracy theories that favour China to Foreign Minister Wang Yi calling for Chinese diplomats to be “wolf warriors”, Beijing has found itself in multiple diplomatic controversies by defending its handling of the pandemic and territorial sovereignty.

With Pelosi’s Taiwan trip, Chinese patriots see that the country is again being targeted, and want a strong external response. This growing nationalism has left Beijing concerned about domestic stability, particularly head of the 20th Party Congress.

It has left Beijing with little choice but to craft responses at the earliest opportunity to deflect criticism, for example by seeking to embarrass other nations over their handling of pandemic containment, or to punish them for holding a different understanding of the “one China” policy.