Qin Gang, an aggressive “wolf warrior” diplomat, had a meteoric rise and an even faster fall from grace. He’s now said to be taking a salary at a Beijing state-run bookseller.

His rise was meteoric, his fall equally abrupt. Ever since the summer of 2023, when then-Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang mysteriously disappeared from public view, his fate has been the subject of intense speculation.

Wild rumors abounded: He’d been imprisoned. Killed himself. None was true.

In fact, Qin is alive but, according to two former U.S. officials, in a position very diminished from his once-lofty perch close to Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Qin has been nominally assigned to a low-level job at a publishing house affiliated with the Chinese Foreign Ministry, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.

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  • InvertedParallax
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    2 months ago

    Ww diplomacy was xi’s brilliant idea that backfired so spectacularly and took years to convince him was a catastrophe.

    Saying they realized xi was being an idiot is impossible so they just slowly let it drop and tried to restore sane diplomacy to counter the US making friends throughout Asia.

    WW diplomacy worked under trump when nobody could count on the US backing them therefore China was the only option, that’s over now.

    • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works
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      2 months ago

      Well yeah, but Qin Gang was the face of it, and was made to take the blame for it, because Dear Leader Winnie the Pooh Xi is not allowed to look like a fool, as a matter of CCP policy.