If you were wondering why China has been pushing out so much anti-U.S. propaganda lately, here’s your answer. An internal report compiled by a think tank connected to China’s intelligence service concludes the coronavirus is creating the biggest anti-China backlash since 1989:

The report, presented early last month by the Ministry of State Security to top Beijing leaders including President Xi Jinping, concluded that global anti-China sentiment is at its highest since the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, the sources said.

As a result, Beijing faces a wave of anti-China sentiment led by the United States in the aftermath of the pandemic and needs to be prepared in a worst-case scenario for armed confrontation between the two global powers, according to people familiar with the report’s content, who declined to be identified given the sensitivity of the matter.

The report was drawn up by the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations (CICIR), a think tank affiliated with the Ministry of State Security, China’s top intelligence body.

China has reacted strongly to any suggestion that it could be held accountable for the damage caused by the coronavirus. Last week a Chinese ambassador made threats of a boycott after Australia recommended an investigation into the origins of the virus:

China has accused Australia of parroting the United States in its call for an inquiry independent of the World Health Organization to determine the origins of COVID-19 and how the world responded to the emerging pandemic.

Chinese Ambassador Cheng Jingye used an Australian newspaper interview this week to warn that pursuing an inquiry could spark a Chinese consumer boycott of students and tourists visiting Australia as well as of sales of major exports including beef and wine…

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo attacked China’s coercion and urged U.S. partner countries to also demand transparency and answers.

“I saw some comments from the Chinese foreign ministry talking about coercive activity with respect to Australia, who had the temerity to ask for an investigation. Who in the world wouldn’t want an investigation of how this happened to the world?” Pompeo told reporters in Washington.

There are probably lots of reasons China doesn’t want the world looking into the origin of the virus and the details of its response. Jazz wrote about one of those earlier today, i.e. China spent the early weeks of the outbreak downplaying the severity of the virus while simultaneously buying up the world’s supply of PPE and other medical supplies.

For the moment China continues it’s two-track approach to the world response. On the one hand it is issuing diplomatically worded pleas for for international cooperation. On the other hand it is openly lying about the origin of the virus, threatening those who push back on the lies and also openly mocking other nations. The most recent example of the mockery approach is this video which China’s Xinhua state media put out last week. The full clip is here. It was not only shared by state media but by China’s Embassy in Paris: