Aiming to direct global perceptions about the ongoing protests in Hong Kong, traces of Chinese propaganda aimed at Western audiences were detected on Facebook and Twitter. Viewed against the slick Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election of 2016, the Chinese equivalents appear ineffective or even bizarre.
China resorted to armies of inauthentic accounts and brute-force attempts to frame the protests along the lines of national pride, sovereignty and anti-terrorism. Why did China behave this way?
