red phone blues

Citing multiple anonymous sources, the New York Times alleges that the real, or at least the urgent, reason for Bo Xilai's downfall was that he was bugging top level leaders. He was found out when bugs on a phone by Ma Wen, the Minister of Supervision, were discovered during an apparently inconsequential conversation between her and none other than Hu Jintao, whose own phone apparently has counter-surveillance devices installed. 

The article makes clear that these allegations did not surface during Wang Lijun's conversations at the Chengdu US consulate. They also play no part in the apparent 'great man brought low by crazy wife' narrative being spun through leaks from the investigation into the Gu Kailai/Neil Heywood affair.

Bo and Wang Lijun allegedly bugged every significant party personage who visited Chongqing; apparently with the aid of Fang Binxing, the GFW architect, whose rumoured arrest James blogged about a few days ago. Involvement in this would explain Fang's disapperance neatly.

UPDATE: Since typepad for some reason won't let me comment on my own blog, I'll stick this in as an update:

Barry@ 2 : The Gu killed Heywood story has now become at least semi-official, through leaks from the investigation. How true it is is another matter. We know that it's the story the Party wants to tell. Still, it's the only story we have in answer to the question 'what happened to Neil Heywood'. I still don't believe the stuff about them having an affair, though.

Alex: Yes, the GFW is just the boundary within which sits a comprehensive information management system. If you're thinking of blogging about this, I'd recommend a scan of China Media Project (first under the China handle in the blogroll). As for opposition voices of the 'right' kind, this Wang Kang fellow in Chongqing is interesting: a professed reformer with no official connection shaping the government narrative on Bo and Gu. 

Comments

[Alex]

Interesting thought - and I'm going to blog this - Fang didn't just create the national firewall, but a whole strategy. It's not "TURN THE INTERNET OFF", it's a semi-permeable membrane which serves both repressive and protectionist aims, while trying to keep out of the way of Internet development. A hard balance to strike.

But it doesn't make sense without also including the positive, proactive side of the strategy. Wumaodang, opinion-management, and even, perhaps, carefully selected opposition voices.

[Barry Freed]

Evan Osnos was on Charlie Rose last night and he told the whole "Gu Kailai murdered Neil Heywood and that was what Wang Lijun ran to the Americans with" story as if it was the gospel truth. Have events moved that quickly? I thought this was all wild rumor -as reported on this very here blog - but I've been swamped with work lately and maybe didn't read carefully enough. It seemed a weird interview and undermined his credibility with me that he'd report it straight like that with no disclaimers or anything - perhaps I misheard but I don't think so.

(It's not online yet so no link but I'd be curious to know what you think.)

{under a deadline so apologize for the rambling incoherence of this comment).

[bert]

It's not online yet

There's this, the first half of which reports the facts as known.

The final line will be fondly remembered by fans of David Remnick's reporting from Russia.

[ajay]

"Minister of Supervision" is a great job title.

[Barry Freed]

He's more careful there: "suspicion of involvement," on Rose it sounded like he was playing Cluedo.

[Barry Freed]

I still don't believe the stuff about them having an affair, though.

Wow, I hadn't known.* It's moving really fast indeed. At this rate how soon before the stuff about the ball gags and gimp masks comes out?

*was that posted about on the blog?

[chris y]

If this is the current Bo thread, can I ask somebody why Sonny Boy here feels it so all consumingly important to stress that his western education was paid for by scholarships and his mother? What's wrong with your dad chipping in to help with your college fees?

[Malcs]

Cos his dad was supposed to be on a state salary of about 16,000 if memory serves.

[Barry Freed]

Osnos on Rose.

[ajay]

Blind lawyer escapes 90 guards: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/27/chinese-activist-fears-insane-retribution

"Chen is believed to have used the cover of darkness in which his blindness – he lost his sight at the age of five – gave him an advantage over his captors. He previously attempted to dig a tunnel without success."

And now he fights crime in Hell's Kitchen...

[Alex]

Interesting note: my younger sister just came to dinner, and a surprising number of people she knows are in China being rent-a-laowais.

[bert]

And there's this, posted yesterday, where he explicitly considers the possibility that the phonetapping story is "the kind of strategic smear that is a classic of purge-politics" (he doesn't think it is), and makes the necessary point that Bo won't have been the only person in China tapping phones. I'd say Osnos isn't doing too terribly, and if there's a specific problem I'd tend to blame Charlie Rose.

Charlie Rose has a good reputation among right-thinking people, and if you compare him to Fox & Friends he's clearly making TV intended for human beings rather than livestock. But I can date for you exactly when I stopped trusting his judgement. Here it is: a sustained display of Freedom Fries-era dickhead huffiness that starts by comparing Germany to a dog and goes downhill from there.
The proper attitude to Bush foreign policy is grateful deference. Anything else counts as unforgiveable effrontery. Well okay, and fuck you Charlie Rose.

[Barry Freed]

I haven't had a chance to give it another viewing and won't till later but IIRC Rose just asked him to tell the story of what has happened re Bo Xilai as is known and that was part of his summary, he didn't need any prompting from Rose.

Re Charlie Rose, I'm ambivalent (well, more than that) but I watch him all the time. I like him less for his interviewing style which varies in quality (I think Terry Gross of NPR is much better) than for his frequently having interesting guests, especially in the arts (and his brain series is very good) and letting them go on uninterrupted by commercials for twenty minutes to a full hour. The thing of it is is that his show on PBS is one of the only outlets for intelligent conversation on TV over here (the only one until Bill Moyers came back) but it's hit or miss and the misses can be outrageous at times. I want to vomit every time he has Henry Kissinger on (an all too frequent guest), or BHL, and the fawning over Christopher Hitchens was revolting - just the other week he had a panel discussion about him for a full hour (said panel included Martin Amis who I can't now watch without wanting someone to ask him what the best strategy is to win at Ms.Pac-Man). And of course, Airmiles is Rose's favorite guest of all time. His was the show where he uttered the infamous "suck on this" quote. But this is the USA and it's the best we've got.

[bert]

Moyers was good, wasn't he. There's several Carter people who went on to do good things in the media. Moyers, Fallows, Hertzberg ...
Contrast with eight years' worth of Clinton people.

That whole Hitchens love-in was very American, despite the Brits imported for the occasion. He was an American by the end, so I suppose that's fair enough. But over here there was nothing like the same amount of gushing.
Amis' pride in the Little Keith nickname was a little odd: "an almost preposterously unattractive young man — practically, for instance, a dwarf ... the sparse straw mat atop a squashed and petulant mask of acne; the dour, bulgy little torso and repulsively truncated limbs; the numb, cadaverous texture of the whole ... As if in reply to these bodily shortcomings, Keith's nature is one utterly lacking in wit, generosity, and charm."

[bert]

I should have said, that was from Dead Babies.

[bert]

Re Osnos: there's a question about what the producers wanted, and what green room discussion there was, but obviously you're right that the person responsible for whatever comes out of Osnos' mouth is Osnos.