One cable, released by whistle-blowing site Wikileaks, cites a "well-placed" contact as saying the action against Google was "100% political".
A politburo member is said to have been angered after Googling his name and finding critical comments online.
The cable says it is unclear whether China's top leaders were involved.
There is also a video for all you tl;dr people.
I think it's only fair to ask China, "why so serious?"
The hardest part of climbing the ladder of success is getting through the crowd at the bottom.