The
Elements of the
China Challenge
by The Policy Planning Staff,
Office of the Secretary of State
November 2020
(Revised December 2020)
Executive Summary
Awareness has been growing in the United States — and in nations around the world — that
the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has triggered a new era of great-power competition.
Yet few discern the pattern in China’s inroads within every region of the world, much less the
specific form of dominance to which the party aspires.
The CCP aims not merely at preeminence within the established world order — an order
that is grounded in free and sovereign nation-states, flows from the universal principles on
which America was founded, and advances U.S. national interests —but to fundamentally
revise world order, placing the People’s Republic of China (PRC) at the center and serving
Beijing’s authoritarian goals and hegemonic ambitions.
In the face of the China challenge, the United States must secure freedom.
China is a challenge because of its conduct. Modeled on 20th
-century Marxist-Leninist
dictatorship, the CCP eventually spurred rapid modernization and produced prodigious
economic growth — thanks in no small measure to the party’s decision in the late 1970s to
embrace free-market elements and to the decision by the United States and nations around the
world to engage, and welcome commerce with, China. The party today wields its economic
power to co-opt and coerce countries around the world; make the societies and politics of
foreign nations more accommodating to CCP specifications; and reshape international
organizations in line with China’s brand of socialism. At the same time, the CCP is developing
a world-class military to rival and eventually surpass the U.S. military. These actions enable
the CCP to credibly pursue the quest — proceeding outward through the Indo-Pacific
region and encompassing the globe — to achieve “national rejuvenation” culminating in the
transformation of the international order.
To understand China’s peculiar form of authoritarianism and the hegemonic goals to which it
gives rise, it is necessary to grasp the intellectual sources from which China’s conduct springs: the
CCP’s Marxist-Leninist beliefs and the party’s extreme interpretation of Chinese nationalism.
Notwithstanding its authoritarian rule over PRC citizens and the threat it presents to freedom
around the world, China under the CCP is marked by a variety of vulnerabilities. These
begin with the disadvantages endemic to autocracy: constraints on innovation, difficulties
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forming and maintaining alliances, and costs arising from internal repression. They also
include vulnerabilities specific to the PRC: economic instability; demographic imbalance;
environmentaldegradation;persistentcorruption;oppressionofethnicandreligiousminorities;
daunting expenses incurred in monitoring, censoring, and indoctrinating 1.4 billion people
in China; separation of the military, which is controlled by the party, from the people; and —
particularly in the wake of the illness, death, and social and economic devastation wrought
worldwide by the COVID-19 pandemic born in Wuhan — mounting international anger at
the CCP’s contempt for human life, indifference to other nations’ well-being, and disregard
for international norms and obligations.
Meeting the China challenge requires the United States to return to the fundamentals. To
secure freedom, America must refashion its foreign policy in light of ten tasks.
First, the United States must secure freedom at home by preserving constitutional government,
promoting prosperity, and fostering a robust civil society, all of which nourish the civic concord
that has always been essential to meeting the nation’s challenges abroad.
Second, the United States must maintain the world’s most powerful, agile, and technologically
sophisticated military while enhancing security cooperation, grounded in common interests
and shared responsibility, with allies and partners.
Third, the United States must fortify the free, open, and rules-based international order that
it led in creating after World War II, which is composed of sovereign nation-states and based
on respect for human rights and fidelity to the rule of law.
Fourth, the United States must reevaluate its alliance system and the panoply of international
organizations in which it participates to determine where they fortify the free, open, and rulesbased
international order and where they fall short.
Fifth, in light of that reevaluation, the United States must strengthen its alliance system by
more effectively sharing responsibilities with friends and partners and by forming a variety of
groupings and coalitions to address specific threats to freedom while, in cooperation with the
world’s democracies and other like-minded partners, reforming international organizations
where possible and, where necessary, building new ones rooted in freedom, democracy, national
sovereignty, human rights, and the rule of law.
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Sixth, the United States must promote American interests by looking for opportunities to
cooperate with Beijing subject to norms of fairness and reciprocity, constraining and deterring
the PRC when circumstances require, and supporting those in China who seek freedom.
Seventh, the United States must educate American citizens about the scope and implications of
the China challenge because only an informed citizenry can be expected to back the complex
mix of demanding policies that the United States must adopt to secure freedom.
Eighth, the United States must train a new generation of public servants — in diplomacy,
military affairs, finance, economics, science and technology, and other fields — and publicpolicy
thinkers who not only attain fluency in Chinese and acquire extensive knowledge
of China’s culture and history, but who also attain fluency in the languages, and acquire
extensive knowledge of the cultures and histories, of other strategic competitors, friends,
and potential friends.
Ninth, the United States must reform American education, equipping students to shoulder
the enduring responsibilities of citizenship in a free and democratic society by understanding
America’s legacy of liberty and also preparing them to meet the special demands of a complex,
information-age, globalized economy for expertise in science, technology, engineering, and
mathematics.
Tenth, the United States must champion the principles of freedom — principles that are at
once universal and at the heart of the American national spirit — through example; speeches;
educational initiatives; public diplomacy; foreign assistance and investment; sanctions in
more difficult circumstances as well as other forms of non-military pressure; and, where the
nation’s vital interests are at stake and all else has failed, military force.
Grounded in America’s founding principles and constitutional traditions; invigorated by
a bustling economy; undergirded by the world’s best-trained and best-equipped military;
served by government officials who understand the American people and the American
political system, recognize the diversity and common humanity of the peoples and nations of
the world, and appreciates the complex interplay of ideas and interests in foreign affairs; and
fortified by an informed and engaged citizenry — this multi-pronged approach will enable
the United States to secure freedom.
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I. The China Challenge
For a fairly long time yet, socialism in its primary stage will exist alongside a
more productive and developed capitalist system. In this long period of cooperation
and conflict, socialism must learn from the boons that capitalism has brought to
civilization. We must face the reality that people will use the strengths of developed,
Western countries to denounce our country’s socialist development. Here we must
have a great strategic determination, resolutely rejecting all false arguments that we
should abandon socialism. We must consciously correct the various ideas that do not
accord with our current stage. Most importantly, we must concentrate our efforts on
bettering our own affairs, continually broadening our comprehensive national power,
improving the lives of our people, building a socialism that is superior to capitalism,
and laying the foundation for a future where we will win the initiative and have
the dominant position.
— Xi Jinping, “Uphold and Develop Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,”
speech to the CCP Central Committee, January 5, 2013
Awareness has been growing in the United States — and in nations around the world — that
the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has triggered a new era of great-power competition.
Even as the United States seeks cooperation and welcomes rules-based competition, responsible
American statecraft depends on grasping the mounting challenge that the People’s Republic
of China (PRC) poses to free and sovereign nation-states and to the free, open, and rulesbased
international order that is essential to their security, stability, and prosperity. The CCP’s
recklessness in allowing the novel coronavirus born in Wuhan to develop into a global pandemic
coupled with the concerted disinformation campaign that Beijing undertook to conceal
China’s culpability should put doubts to rest. Yet many people lack a proper understanding
of the character and scope of the China challenge.
Home to an extraordinary culture and to moral and political traditions stretching back
thousands of years, China today is a great power governed by an authoritarian regime modeled
on 20th
-century Marxist-Leninist dictatorship. Prodigious economic growth has enriched
China. Major military modernization has emboldened it. And nations around the world have
enabled the CCP by engaging, and welcoming commerce with, Beijing.
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Few, however, discern the pattern in the PRC’s inroads in every region of the world, much less
the specific form of preeminence to which the CCP aspires. The failure to understand China’s
interests and objectives derives in no small measure from neglect of the CCP’s governing ideas.1
Just as America’s commitment to a free, open, and rules-based international order composed
of sovereign nation states arises from our dedication to “unalienable rights” — the language
that America’s Declaration of Independence uses to describe the rights inherent in all persons2
— so too does the PRC’s determination to achieve “national rejuvenation” and transform the
international order so that it places China at the center and serves Beijing’s ruling ambitions
stem from the CCP’s Marxist-Leninist ideology and hyper-nationalist convictions.3
The conventional wisdom long supposed that China is best understood in accordance with
ideas of reasonable state behavior. For decades, influential observers in and out of government
viewed China’s rise as an opportunity to enlarge the world market and thereby benefit all nations
through increased global commerce. They lauded Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s decision
in the late 1970s to introduce capitalist elements into the PRC’s state-controlled economy,
which — over time and with assistance from the United States and other advanced industrial
nations — spurred rapid modernization and generated double-digit economic growth. They
hoped that incorporating a rising China into the established international order would induce
Beijing to fully open and privatize its state-directed economy; to liberalize its authoritarian
regime; and eventually to become a “responsible stakeholder” upholding the international
order. Even after the CCP’s bloody June 1989 crackdown on hundreds of thousands of prodemocracy
protesters in Tiananmen Square and throughout the country, many in the United
States and around the world clung to high hopes for China.4
But the much-anticipated political liberalization did not occur. China might have chosen
the democratic path of former dictatorships in East Asia like South Korea and Taiwan.
Speculations about “the end of history” — that liberal democracy, owing to its reasonableness
and universal appeal, was spreading around the globe — nourished the faith.5
But the CCP has
stuck to its authoritarian convictions. The party consistently affirmed its fidelity to MarxismLeninism
as a paradigm for China’s governance, and socialism — the state control of economy
and society — as a model not only for the PRC but also for other nations and as the basis
of an alternative world order.6
Still, some persist in believing that China’s conduct will stay
within recognizable boundaries and that Beijing merely acts as would any great power in its
geopolitical circumstances.7
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Meanwhile, the CCP has patiently developed the PRC’s capabilities over the last 40 years with
the long-term goal of achieving global preeminence and placing a socialist stamp on world
order. Captive to the conventional wisdom, the United States and other countries proceeded
largely unaware of or indifferent to the long-term strategic competition launched by the CCP
and affirmed with increasing boldness by CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping. As a veteran U.S.
policymaker recently wrote, “This prolonged failure in China policy could turn out to be the
biggest U.S. policy deficiency in the past seven decades, given the accumulating dangerous
strategic consequences of the rise of Chinese power for world order as well as for the United
States and its allies and friends.”8
Even as proponents of the conventional wisdom dug in their heels, keen observers of China
effected a salutary shift in perspective. Their books and articles bring into focus the CCP’s
one-party, repressive rule as well as its defiance of, and determination to remake, international
norms, standards, and institutions.9
The Trump Administration achieved a fundamental break with the conventional wisdom. It
concluded that the CCP’s resolute conduct and self-professed goals require the United States
and other countries to revise assumptions and develop a new strategic doctrine to address the
primacy and magnitude of the China challenge. The administration presented its thinking to
the public in the 2017 National Security Strategy, 2018 National Defense Strategy, 2020United
States Strategic Approach to the People’s Republic of China, 2020 annual report to Congress on
China’s military power, and in many high-profile speeches by senior administration figures.10
The administration’s outlook recognizes that it is unreasonable to suppose that today’s leaders
of the Chinese Communist Party — who view themselves as heirs to a great civilization, who
espouse a 20th
-century ideology and political system the cruelty and repression of which have
left tens of millions dead, and who pursue hyper-nationalist goals — comprehend domestic
politics and world affairs as do the United States and other liberal democracies.11
In recent
years, the CCP has consolidated authority and — by nefarious means ranging from digital
surveillance to indoctrination to concentration camps for religious and ethnic minorities —
intensified the subordination of PRC citizens to party-defined collective interests. The CCP
has developed — and acquired illegally in many instances — advanced technologies not only
to control its own population but also to collect data on persons across the globe and to build
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a world-class military. The CCP has pursued extravagant claims in, and militarization of, the
South China Sea in brazen defiance of international law while crushing freedom in Hong Kong
and threatening to do the same in Taiwan. The CCP has undertaken major infrastructure and
investment projects, debt-trap diplomacy, and other predatory economic practices in every
region of the world, the better to induce or compel sovereign nation-states, particularly their
governing and business elites, to aid and abet China in the reshaping of world order. And
the CCP has leveraged its integration into international organizations to infuse them with
norms and standards rooted in the party’s authoritarianism.
China’s conduct reflects the CCP’s short-term priorities and long-term ambitions, the
party’s assessment of China’s current stage of development, and its understanding of the
geopolitical environment in which China operates. “In this long period of cooperation and
conflict, socialism must learn from the boons that capitalism has brought to civilization,” Xi
proclaimed in 2013. “Most importantly, we must concentrate our efforts on bettering our
own affairs, continually broadening our comprehensive national power, improving the lives
of our people, building a socialism that is superior to capitalism, and laying the foundation
for a future where we will win the initiative and have the dominant position”12
(emphasis
added). Examination of the CCP’s conduct in light of its communist and hyper-nationalist
ideas demonstrates that by achieving “the initiative” and attaining “the dominant position,”
Xi means displacing the United States as the world’s foremost power and restructuring world
order to conform to the CCP’s distinctive way of empire.
The purpose of this unclassified Policy Planning Staff paper is to step back and take a longterm
view, elaborate the elements of the China challenge, and sketch a framework for the
fashioning of sturdy policies that stand above bureaucratic squabbles and interagency turf
battles and transcend short-term election cycles. The United States’ overarching aim should
be to secure freedom.
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II. China’s Conduct
To understand the character of the contest for supremacy launched by the CCP, it is necessary
to grasp the major features of China’s conduct. These include the PRC’s brand of authoritarian
governance, its use of economic might to surpass the United States in influence in every region
of the world as well as in international organizations, and its development of a world-class
military designed to counter and eventually surpass the U.S. military. These features have
been studied in isolation and each is well-known to experts in one field or another. Their
comprehensive and interlocking character, however, is not widely appreciated. Considering
them together brings into focus the CCP’s paramount geopolitical aim: to achieve global
preeminence by reorganizing the international order around the party’s understanding of
socialism.
Authoritarianism at Home
China’s conduct in world affairs stems from the CCP’s form of authoritarian government. In
line with 20th
-century communist dogma and the precepts and practices of Marxist-Leninist
regimes, the CCP exercises repressive, single-party rule over some 1.4 billion people. Recently,
the party amended the PRC constitution to remove term limits on the presidency occupied
by CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping.
In the decades after the violent suppression of pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen
Square in 1989, the CCP intensified internal repression and fortified its control over the
country by expanding the systematic use of indoctrination, censorship, disinformation, hightech
surveillance, forced disappearances, and other brutal means.13
To erase the ethnic and
religious identities of Xinjiang’s nearly 11 million Turkic Muslims, the party has damaged and
destroyed mosques; imprisoned more than one million Uyghurs in so-called “re-education”
camps that subject prisoners to ideological training, compulsory labor, forced sterilization,
involuntary birth control, and other heinous abuses; and implemented mass surveillance, DNA
collection, and other forms of coercive social control.14
As part of China’s national policy to
forcibly integrate minorities, which is sometimes referred to as “stability maintenance,” the
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CCP has heightened repression of some 6 million Tibetans — severely restricting freedom
of speech, religion, movement, association, and assembly.15
It has also curtailed the freedom
of more than 4 million ethnic Mongolians living in China’s Inner Mongolian Autonomous
Region in an effort to sinicize them.16
And, as part of its crackdown on Christians in China,
a population estimated to number as many as 70 million, the CCP has imprisoned pastors,
shut down churches, banned online religious services, and contemplated a plan to rewrite
the Bible to purge it of ideas that conflict with party dogma.17
The CCP also seeks to extend the reach of China’s sovereignty. In the months following the
outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, China — in defiance of its promises to keep Hong
Kong free and open and to maintain the territory’s high degree of autonomy under the 1984
Sino-British Joint Declaration and Hong Kong’s Basic Law — imposed a national security
law that destroys the territory’s autonomy and robs Hong Kong’s residents of their essential
freedoms.18
Beijing also insists that Taiwan — today a free and prosperous democracy —
has always been and must remain part of China and threatens reunification by military
force.19
And, asserting maritime claims in the South China Sea far beyond those recognized
by international law, China has shifted the balance of power in the sea by building on and
militarizing disputed islands.20
The communism that the CCP professes is more than a mode of authoritarian domestic
governance. It is also a theory of a globe-spanning universal society, the ultimate dream of
which is to bring about an international order that serves the CCP’s socialist purposes. At the
same time, the CCP proclaims hyper-nationalist aspirations with roots in Chinese cultural
and political traditions — however much twisted and deformed by the party — that require
the PRC to occupy the commanding position in world affairs. The party’s synthesis of
20th-century communist dogma and extreme Chinese nationalism drives the PRC’s conduct
within and beyond its borders.
Economic Co-optation and Coercion Abroad
Economic power is a leading element of the CCP’s quest for preeminence in world affairs.
Before modernization, China often acquired leverage over its neighbors, whom it more or less
9
viewed as comprising the known world, through the creation of dependence in commerce.21
Today, thanks in part to globalization and to the CCP’s rapid modernization over the last
forty years, the known world for China has expanded to encompass the globe. The CCP has
adapted the old approach to China’s new circumstances. All major economies are vulnerable
to the CCP’s economic co-optation and coercion because of their extensive commercial
ties with the PRC and their desire to maintain access to China’s low-cost labor force and
enormous consumer markets. America’s own economic entwinement with China dwarfs
U.S. commercial relations with the former Soviet Union.22
As China reaped the benefits of modernization and accelerated economic development, the
CCP set its sights on dominating the global economy by leading in the cutting-edge sciences
and the high-tech revolution. On its way to building the world’s second largest economy after
the United States, the party developed various initiatives and programs integral to Beijing’s
long-term strategy of using a “whole-of-nation” approach to achieve — including by deceptive,
corrupt, and illicit means — decisive advantage over the United States and other advanced
industrial nations.
First, China engages in massive intellectual-property theft.23
The PRC has perpetrated the
greatest illegitimate transfer of wealth in human history, stealing technological innovation
and trade secrets from companies, universities, and the defense sectors of the United States
and other nations.24
According to research cited by the Office of the United States Trade
Representative, China’s efforts — including forced technology transfer, cyberattacks, and a
whole-of-nation approach to economic and industrial espionage — cost the U.S. economy
as much as $600 billion annually.25
This staggering sum approaches the Pentagon’s annual
national defense budget and exceeds the total profits of the Fortune 500’s top 50 companies.
All 56 FBI field offices are conducting China-related economic-espionage investigations across
nearly every industrial sector.26
Second, China pursues control over key international supply chains and essential materials
and goods. Since Beijing’s controversial 2001 accession to the World Trade Organization,
U.S. multinational companies have relied increasingly on the PRC’s low-cost labor force
to produce and export cheaper finished goods, especially in high-technology and advancedmanufacturing
sectors. This shift resulted in lower prices for U.S. consumers and higher profits
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for U.S. companies. Among the costs, however, was a “China Shock” that devastated smalland
medium-sized manufacturing in the United States and other nations, wiping out as many
as 2.4 million jobs in America alone and leaving crucial international supply chains dependent
on China.27
The global pandemic has thrown this supply-chain vulnerability into sharp relief.
Third, China seeks worldwide industrial dominance, particularly in critical high-tech sectors.
While manufacturing superiority proved decisive in U.S. victories in World War II and the
Cold War, the United States lost that advantage in many essential industries. For example,
China today accounts for 50 percent of global steel and aluminum production, 70 percent
of consumer electronics manufacturing capacity, 90 percent of consumer drone production,
45 percent of shipbuilding production, and, by 2022, will likely account for 35 percent of
the world’s integrated-circuit fabrication capacity.28
By 2022, China and Taiwan also are set
to house 70 percent of global capacity for integrated-circuit fabrication, including virtually
all cutting-edge production,29
which is vital to the digital economy, advanced weapons
systems, aerospace, artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and other essential industries. The
PRC aggressively implements industrial policy through efforts like its “Made in China 2025”
initiative, which develops Chinese “national champion” companies in ten decisive areas:
(1) AI, quantum computing, and next-generation information technology; (2) robotics
and automation; (3) aerospace and space; (4) high-tech shipping and oceanic engineering;
(5) high-speed railway; (6) energy efficiency; (7) new materials; (8) biotechnology, medical
devices, and advanced pharmaceuticals; (9) next-generation energy and power generation; and
(10) agricultural machinery.30
By displacing the United States and other advanced industrial
nations in these domains, China intends not only to acquire control over global commerce, but
also to support its “Military-Civil Fusion” (MCF) strategy for leveraging legally and illegally
acquired advanced and emerging technologies to drive economic and military modernization.
The PRC’s progress in AI poses a particular risk because the CCP, unconstrained by respect
for individual liberty and human rights, exploits the massive quantities of data that it collects
to refine the AI algorithms that will power the next generation of networked technology.31
Fourth, China aims to build the world’s fifth generation (5G) wireless-telecommunications
physical and digital infrastructure as a steppingstone to broader dominance in emerging and
next-generation information technologies. Beijing heavily subsidizes state-directed Huawei
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and ZTE, enabling these telecommunications behemoths to undercut rivals in the race to
construct 5G networks on every continent.32
Since Huawei and ZTE are subject to China’s
various national security laws that compel them to “support, assist and cooperate with the
state intelligence work,” countries that use them as 5G vendors face substantial threats to
their network integrity, data privacy, economic stability, and national security.33
Moreover,
under the guise of so-called “smart city” development projects, Huawei and ZTE can export
to autocratic regimes around the world the same Orwellian tools that they provide the CCP
to surveil people in China.34
Meanwhile, since military operations, espionage, and political
warfare depend on information and data, China invests large sums to gain advantage in
cyberspace, including physical architecture, operating systems, and hardware.35
Fifth, the CCP uses the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) — originally called One Belt One
Road (OBOR) and still so designated by the PRC in Chinese-language sources — and other
undertakings to expand foreign markets for Chinese companies and as a means of drawing
nations, particularly their political and economic elites, into Beijing’s geopolitical orbit. BRI
infrastructure projects — ports, railroads, highways, dams, industrial parks, civil nuclear
facilities and other energy related initiatives, and more — typically rely on imported Chinese
workers rather than local labor, and sometimes involve 50- to 100-year business relationships
that entrench China’s long-term access to local elites and confer power over key parts of the
host country’s critical infrastructure. Because of the heavy economic and environmental costs
imposed by the CCP, host countries increasingly find these BRI projects unsustainable.As a
result of China’s predatory development program and debt-trap diplomacy, for example, Sri
Lanka lost control of a major port after defaulting on a burdensome loan.36
Sixth, China leverages often unfettered access to foreign capital markets.37
In particular, U.S.
stock exchanges today list over 130 Chinese companies — including Alibaba, PetroChina
Company Limited, China Life Insurance Company Limited, China Petroleum & Chemical
Corporation, Baidu, and Tencent — with a combined valuation of over $1 trillion.38
Following
massive financial and accounting scandals in the early 2000s, the U.S. Congress enacted laws
requiring regulators to inspect the audits of all U.S.-listed companies.39
China is the only
country that invokes its state security laws to block U.S. regulators from conducting these
inspections.40
Moreover, U.S. investors and pension holders unwittingly pour billions into
12
managed funds that invest in Chinese companies that are listed on exchanges outside the United
States. Some foreign-listed Chinese companies — including Hikvision, Dahua Technology,
and the weapons-manufacturing subsidiaries of Aviation Industry Corporation of China —
have ties to Beijing’s military modernization, espionage, and human rights abuses, and may
be subject to U.S. sanctions and export controls.41
Seventh, China exploits the freedom and openness of the world’s liberal democracies to
undercut their governance, prosperity, and national security. Beijing regularly threatens
to cut off access to its vast markets to force foreign businesses in free countries to conform
to the CCP’s political demands and speech regulations. Prominent cases include China’s
efforts to compel foreign airlines to list Taiwan as part of the PRC, to silence the National
Basketball Association after the Houston Rockets’ then-general manager tweeted — from
U.S. soil — his support for Hong Kong protesters seeking to preserve their city’s individual
freedoms and political autonomy, and to extract an apology from Mercedes-Benz for using
an image of the Dalai Lama in online advertising.42
In addition, the CCP carries out massive
propaganda and disinformation efforts.43
The party uses the Thousand Talents Program
(TTP) and other party-run recruitment efforts to target universities and impel students and
professors to obtain — lawfully or otherwise — technology, trade secrets, proprietary data,
and research and development.44
It generously funds Confucius Institutes, which specialize in
disseminating CCP propaganda,45
at universities in the United States and in other countries
through confidential funding agreements that oblige the institutions to avoid criticism
of China and to otherwise comply with CCP objectives.46
And the CCP tracks foreign
government officials at the national and subnational levels, not least in the United States, to
find opportunities for influence.47
By means of these and other initiatives and programs — and unconstrained by respect for
international law and human rights — the PRC wields its vast economic power globally
to bring countries under its sway. The CCP increasingly links its clout in commerce and
investment to shows of advanced military capabilities.
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A World-Class Military
China’s economic might and technological prowess advance its development of a world-class
military that is intended to rival and in the long-term surpass the U.S. military and those of its
allies.48
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA), which owes allegiance to the CCP, is central to
the party’s goal of empowering China to play the decisive role on the world stage. Following
his selection in 2012 as CCP General Secretary, Xi Jinping intensified the PLA’s decades-long
military modernization. Also named chairman of the Central Military Commission, Xi used
the 2012 Defense White Paper to direct the PLA to achieve a status “commensurate with”
China’s “international standing.”49
On January 1, 2016, the PLA announced a comprehensive
reorganization of its force structure, setting the military on a path of expansion that paralleled
China’s economic advances, and which would enable it “to combat and win battles.”50
The CCP’s extensive military transformation exhibits China’s strategic intentions. The
2016 reorganization created five theater-based joint commands — akin to the United States’
geographic commands — and two functional commands. The responsibilities of the newly
formed Strategic Support Force (SSF) include cyber and space operations and electronic warfare
as well as psychological-warfare operations. The SSF, along with Joint Logistics Support Force,
will enable the PLA to project military power over great distances and to contest “new military
strategic commanding heights.”51
The 2016 reform elevated China’s nuclear command, which
Xi emphasizes are essential to China’s major-power status, from a subordinate command to
a separate stand-alone military service. Accordingly, he called upon the PLA Rocket Force
“to enhance its nuclear deterrents and nuclear counterstrike capabilities.”52
Having undertaken these structural reforms, Xi used the 19th
Party Congress in October 2017
to announce goals for the transformation of the PLA’s operations and capabilities. He directed
the military to achieve mechanization, make strides in applying information technology,
and improve its strategic capabilities. His goal is to complete the transformation of the PLA
and the People’s Armed Police into “world-class forces by 2049, the 100th
anniversary of the
PRC’s founding.”53
China learned well from U.S. military success in the 1991 Gulf War and the military offset
14
strategy the United States adopted in the 1970s to address the Soviet challenge.54
To counter
the U.S. military’s technological advantage, PLA leadership developed an offset strategy of
its own. Top officials in the U.S. Department of Defense have warned that the United States
can no longer take for granted military superiority in East Asia.55
China embarked on five distinct but mutually supporting lines of effort:
• “Military-Civil Fusion” (MCF), one objective of which seeks to achieve the world’s
most technologically sophisticated military by acquiring, including through illegal
means, advanced and emerging technologies from the United States and from countries
around the globe;
• “Systems-destruction warfare” strategy — emphasizing attacks on command and
control centers — to shut down enemy operational systems;
• Vast arsenals of ground-based precision missiles to penetrate U.S. defenses;
• “Assassin’s Mace” capabilities to surprise the adversary from unexpected vectors;
• Industrial dominance to attain world leadership in artificial intelligence.56
China’s offset strategy supports a form of asymmetric arms racing. Beijing has invested in
large numbers of ground-based theater missiles, third- and fourth-generation aircraft carrying
advanced standoff missiles, diesel submarines capable of dominating regional waters, counterspace
and cyber capabilities, and an increasingly advanced nuclear arsenal. The PLA’s rapid
progress in producing and deploying hypersonic missiles — designed to defeat U.S. and allied
missile defenses — underscores Beijing’s determination to achieve asymmetric advantages.57
It
does not appear that China is mirroring Soviet behavior by sprinting to quantitative nuclear
parity, but evidence mounts that Beijing seeks to at least double the size of its nuclear forces
and achieve a form of qualitative equivalence with the United States.58
Meanwhile, China has placed more satellites in space than any country other than the United
States.59
Beijing is also working on a range of counter-space and anti-satellite capabilities
designed to threaten U.S. nuclear and critical military command and control assets.60
The PLA
demonstrated its progress in 2007 when it conducted a successful anti-satellite test, destroying
a Chinese satellite operating in the same low-earth orbit as U.S. military-imaging satellites.
15
The PRC also adopted non-military stratagems to complicate U.S. military operations. Previous
administrations cited nonproliferation as a bright spot in U.S.-China cooperation, but the
evidence belies the rosy assessments. Despite Chinese commitments, Iran, North Korea and
Syria continue to obtain WMD material and technology from Chinese entities while using
Chinese territory as a transshipment point.61
According to the State Department’s annual
report on international compliance with arms control, nonproliferation, and disarmament
agreements, China “has failed to adhere to its November 2000 commitment to the United
States not to assist ‘in any way, any country in the development of ballistic missiles that can
be used to deliver nuclear weapons (i.e., missiles capable of delivering a payload of at least
500 kilograms to a distance of at least 300 kilometers).’”62
The report went on to note, “This
failure to adhere to its November 2000 commitment is reflected in Chinese entities’ continued
supply of items to missile programs of proliferation concern.”63
Beijing’s direct assistance to
WMD proliferators declined after it signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in 1992.
Yet China continues to support, or at least condone, the proliferation of WMD and missile
capabilities in order to undermine the security of those whom the PRC considers regional
or global adversaries.64
While the PRC uses an offset strategy to advance its objectives in the first island chain
— stretching from Japan to Taiwan to the northern Philippines to northern Borneo to
the Malay Peninsula — CCP leadership and military strategists believe that AI and other
emerging technologies will drive a revolution in military affairs that culminates in what they
call “intelligent warfare.”65
By implementing a whole-of-system strategy and driving this
revolution, the CCP hopes the PLA will achieve military dominance within the next 25 years.
In the near-to-medium term, China will use its military capabilities, operational concepts, and
overall doctrine to turn the U.S. military’s technological strengths in the Indo-Pacific into
weaknesses by credibly threatening to deliver massive punishment against American powerprojection
forces while thwarting the United States’ ability to provide reinforcement. This
would signal to regional powers a fait accompli too costly to overturn. The PRC’s strategy is
not only to prevail but also to demoralize America’s friends and partners by demonstrating
that the United States cannot meet its security commitments in the region — at least not
quickly or at an acceptable cost. This strategy is especially pertinent to Taiwan.66
16
China’s Long March to Global Preeminence: Increasing Region-byRegion
Influence and Reshaping International Organizations
China’s quest for preeminence — powered by economic might, cutting-edge technology, and
an increasingly powerful military — proceeds outward through the Indo-Pacific to encompass
the globe. It includes the reshaping of international organizations, a domain critical to the
CCP’s efforts to remake the norms and standards of global governance.
The Indo-Pacific
After World War II, the United States helped to develop the Indo-Pacific’s free and open order.
The PRC seeks to diminish U.S. influence by fostering a sense in the region’s nations that
China’s dominance is inevitable. Prime targets include U.S. treaty-based allies — Japan, South
Korea, Australia, Thailand, and the Philippines — as well as strategic partners such as India,
Vietnam, Indonesia, and Taiwan. The PRC is also undermining the security, autonomy, and
economic interests of many others in the region — such as member states of the Association
of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), including those in the vital Mekong Region, as well as
the nations of the Pacific Islands. Moreover, China perceives rising India as a rival and seeks
to impel it to accommodate Beijing’s ambitions by engaging economically while constraining
New Delhi’s strategic partnership with the United States, Japan, and Australia, and its relations
with other democracies.
Beijing provides digital technology and physical infrastructure to advance the CCP’s
authoritarian objectives throughout the region, including Northeast Asia, the South China
Sea, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific Islands. In addition to efforts to become the region’s 5G
vendor of choice, China pursues deals on airports, seaports, and other infrastructure — for
example, a 99-year lease on Australia’s Port Darwin, a $10-billion deal to build the Philippines’s
Sangley Point International Airport outside Manila, and a $1.3-billion project to construct
Burma’s Kyaukphyu deep-sea port.67
China has employed campaigns of disinformation and other forms of malign interference in
democracies across the Indo-Pacific, including Australia, New Zealand, and Taiwan. The CCP
17
aims to erode democratic institutions and norms, not least through intimidation designed to
compel the adoption of policies that advance China’s interests.68
In South and Central Asia, the PRC invests heavily in transportation infrastructure to expand
trade routes to Eurasia and Europe and to secure the flow of energy, raw materials, and other
resources. The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) serves as the Belt and Road
Initiative’s Central Asia flagship. CPEC also connects to the BRI’s “21st Century Maritime
Silk Road,” greatly enhancing China’s access to the Middle East through Pakistan’s Gwadar
port and linking to PRC projects at Sri Lanka’s Hambantota port, Bangladesh’s Chittagong
port, and the Maldives’s Feydhoo Finolhu Port.69
Through Chinese companies that are often
untrustworthy vendors, the CCP offers public-security solutions — featuring “command
centers, CCTV cameras, intelligent video surveillance, facial and license plate recognition
technology, crowd monitoring, situational awareness detection, noise monitoring or detection,
abandoned object detection, and social media monitoring”70
— to countries across the region.
China supplements economic power in the Indo-Pacific with demonstrations of military
capability. The PLA Air Force regularly conducts long-range bomber patrols out to the
second island chain71
(stretching from Japan through the Mariana Islands and Micronesia)
while the PLA Navy operates surface and sub-surface naval forces from Southeast Asia to
the Indian Ocean, and challenges naval and law enforcement vessels in the South China Sea
and East China Sea. The PLA recently provoked skirmishes along its disputed border with
India, which killed dozens on both sides, and remains in a tense standoff with India’s military.
Beijing menaces democratic Taiwan, which it considers a renegade province, intending to
reunify Taiwan with the Mainland — by force if necessary.72
And the PLA Navy and Chinese
Coast Guard increasingly challenge Japan’s administrative control of the Senkaku Islands.73
China flexes its muscles in the Indo-Pacific in open defiance of international law. For example,
since seizing administrative control of the Scarborough Shoal following a 2012 standoff
with the Philippines, China has used PLA naval and civilian patrols to assert sovereignty
over the shoal. Beijing dismissed the Permanent Court of Arbitration’s 2016 ruling, which
rejects the PRC’s so-called “nine-dash line” historical claims to the South China Sea and
upholds the Philippines’s claim to the shoal.74
The PRC also ignored the Permanent Court
of Arbitration’s 2016 ruling that the Mischief Reef in the South China Sea belongs to the
18
Philippines’s continental shelf and falls under its Exclusive Economic Zone. In defiance of
the legal judgment, China maintains a military base, harbor, and runway on the atoll.75
By
deploying anti-ship cruise missiles, long-range surface-to-air missiles, and other military systems
in the Spratly Islands, moreover, the PRC blatantly violates Xi’s 2015 public pledge that
“China does not intend to pursue militarization” in the disputed areas.76
China intensified
its maritime militarization by provoking a dispute in December 2019, over the sovereignty of
Indonesia’s Natuna Islands. In June 2020, China sank a Vietnamese fishing trawler, and, also
this year, engaged in a six-month standoff with Malaysia over hydrocarbon resources in the
latter’s Exclusive Economic Zone.77
Finally, while China voted for all ten rounds of United
Nations sanctions against North Korea, Beijing watered down each resolution and continues
to aid the dictatorial regime in Pyongyang through the provision of food, oil, and investment.78
By reducing pressure on North Korea, China’s uneven enforcement of the sanctions regime
enables Pyongyang to develop its nuclear weapons program.79
Russia
China finds a strategic partner in Russia, a fellow authoritarian power. In recent months, U.S.
government officials and other international observers have noted Beijing’s growing efforts to
coordinate with Moscow to spread disinformation around the world on COVID-19.80
The
current version of China’s and Russia’s strategic partnership, however, long predates the global
pandemic.81
While neither a formal military alliance nor devoid of tension, this partnership
is grounded in shared interests — most notably weakening U.S. power and influence — and
in recent years Beijing and Moscow have substantially expanded it.82
China has intensified economic, energy, and technological ties with Russia — especially after
the United States and European nations imposed sanctions in response to Moscow’s illegal
occupation and annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its continuing aggression in the eastern
Ukraine. The PRC worked with Russia to increase use of the Chinese yuan and Russian ruble
over the U.S. dollar in bilateral trade, in part to insulate both nations from U.S.-led financial
sanctions.83
China remains Russia’s biggest trading partner,84
and Russia has emerged as one
of Beijing’s top oil suppliers: Moscow dropped to number two in 2019 after Saudi Arabia’s
record 83.3 million tonnes of annual oil exports to the PRC slightly eclipsed Russia’s previous
19
record of 77.6 million tonnes.85
Beijing and Moscow also initiated a “Power of Siberia” natural
gas pipeline to the PRC, a $55 billion project over the next three decades that forms part of a
larger $400 billion development deal for Russian natural gas.86
In addition, Russia and China
cooperate in pursuit of energy in the Arctic, though Moscow and other Arctic nations eye
with varying degrees of wariness the PRC’s efforts to establish itself as a “near-Arctic state.”87
Beijing and Moscow share a strong interest in the race for advanced technologies, with Russian
President Vladimir Putin describing the U.S.-led international campaign against China’s
telecommunications giant Huawei as “the first technological war of the coming digital era.”88
Authoritarian powers deeply distrustful of their own peoples, the PRC and Russia cooperate
on surveillance and artificial intelligence for security and strategic applications.89
The convergence in their extensive use of propaganda and disinformation reflects the growing
strategic alignment between Russia and China. Like Russia, the PRC finds fertile opportunities
for expanding influence in European countries that are struggling to fight endemic corruption
as they build sturdy, transparent, and accountable political institutions. Both China and
Russia use strategic corruption — that is, the weaponization for strategic ends of corrupt
individuals, organizations, and government bodies — to weaken freedom and democracy.90
Chinese influence operations in Europe, which have accelerated amid the COVID-19 pandemic,
increasingly resemble those of Russia in their aggressive use of disinformation, manipulation
of social divisions, and propagation of conspiracies.
The renewed Sino-Russian partnership involves a consequential military component. Having
long served as China’s principal arms supplier and exercise partner, Russia recently enhanced
the types of weapons — including the S-400 air-defense system, Sovremenny-class destroyers,
and advanced cruise missiles for anti-ship warfare — that it sells to China.91
The partnership
also has resulted in more sophisticated joint military exercises aimed at preparing for encounters
with the United States and its allies and partners.92
Cooperation between Beijing and Moscow
extends beyond the operational military level to include nuclear and strategic issues. In June
2019, Xi and Putin released a joint statement pledging to work together on nuclear armscontrol
issues and committing to maintain global strategic stability.93
A short time later, the
two nations marked a new stage of strategic cooperation by conducting a joint long-range
bomber patrol with nuclear-capable aircraft that violated South Korean and Japanese airspace.94
20
While the PRC and Russia operate as strategic partners, growing power disparities — along
with the inevitable distrust that marks relations among authoritarian powers — make the
establishment of a formal alliance unlikely.95
As the U.S. Economic and Security Review
Commission has observed, “There are a number of areas where Beijing’s and Moscow’s
national interests do not align, such as territorial claims and partnerships with countries
that Russia or China consider regional rivals.”96
Moreover, Russia’s economic decline and
China’s global rise — the PRC’s GDP is about eight times that of Russia’s economy, which
suffers from stagnant growth and onerous sanctions97
— render Moscow the “junior partner,”
raising Russian concerns that the PLA will become a military threat.98
Europe
With their advanced economies and considerable diplomatic influence, the European Union
and the UK have emerged as an important front in the strategic competition between the
United States and China. Knowing that a united transatlantic alliance would provide great
advantages to the United States and allies and partners in the struggle over the shape of world
order, the PRC wields its economic power to divide Europe from the United States and pull
European nations toward Beijing. Beijing does not necessarily seek allies in Europe; rather,
it seeks to dissuade nations in the region from aligning with the United States and to limit
Europe’s ability to unite against China. The PRC wants to convince European nations that
their political future lies not in the free, open, and rules-based international order, but in
a new multipolar arrangement that respects geopolitical spheres of influence and regards
allegations of internal repression as infringements on national sovereignty.
As early as 2013, China identified Europe as a core component of the Belt and Road Initiative.
That year, Xi introduced the Silk Road Economic Belt to “forge closer ties, deepen cooperation,
and expand the development space in the Eurasian region.”99
The PRC later announced a New
Eurasian Land Bridge traversing Kazakhstan, Russia, and Belarus and ending in Rotterdam.
Beijing also proposed a China-Arctic Ocean-Europe Blue Economic passage, one of three
maritime passages.100
Beyond the economic, political, and technological benefits, the PRC
sees a BRI-forged direct line from Beijing to Europe as a counter to what it describes as U.S.
encirclement efforts and as a way to balance against U.S. or Western encroachment in the
Indo-Pacific.101
21
To persuade Europeans to pursue economic opportunities in the East, China is conducting
negotiations with Brussels over an EU-China Comprehensive Investment Agreement. Between
2014 and 2019, China leveraged its initial investment in Europe’s eastern and southern
periphery through a series of Memorandums of Understanding. Beijing develops these
investments through what was originally called its “16+1 cooperation framework,” the
nominal purpose of which was greater regional economic integration. In 2019, in the face of
growing EU skepticism toward BRI, China turned the 16+1 into the 17+1 by incorporating
Greece into the framework. The CCP viewed Athens’ inclusion as a victory, especially given
China’s substantial investment in the port of Piraeus and the potential for greater access
stemming from investments in other European ports and railroads. With a symbolic nod to
the ancient Silk Road connecting the empires of Han and Rome, Italy recently became the
first G7 country to sign a BRI MOU.
Despite skepticism in the European core, the UK, France, and Germany remain open to
Chinese foreign direct investment, both to achieve greater independence from the United
States and as a path out of the Eurozone’s economic struggles. The PRC has greatly increased
investment in Europe — from less than $1 billion in 2008 to a high of approximately $42
billion in 2017.102
These large sums promote PRC military and technology interests and
include financing for robotics, biotechnology, real estate, financial services, and infrastructure.
Beijing uses its enhanced leverage to stifle meaningful criticism of its policies.
Huawei is keen to build Europe’s 5G networks. To the extent that this Chinese “national
champion” succeeds, Beijing would obtain access to European states’ information flows,
achieve a fuller understanding of their telecommunications vulnerabilities, acquire the
ability to disrupt critical infrastructure and intercept sensitive transmissions, and accumulate
enormous amounts of data crucial to refining AI algorithms.
Likewise, China pursues opportunities in the civil nuclear markets across Europe, hoping to
benefit from long-term partnerships, not least by obtaining control of important elements of
European energy infrastructure.103
Backed by state financing, Chinese nuclear companies distort
the market and undercut European and U.S. companies. The CCP has openly threatened
governments in Europe that have merely paused to consider the economic and nationalsecurity
costs of cooperating with China on critical infrastructure projects.104
22
The Middle East and Africa
In the near term, China aims to enhance its energy security in the Middle East and obtain
market access to extend the Belt and Road Initiative and other PRC interests. Beijing also
actively engages with the Iranian regime and Syria’s Assad regime, both of which face significant
U.S. and international sanctions and also are U.S.-designated State Sponsors of Terrorism,
proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, and egregious abusers of human rights. At the
same time, the PRC’s brutal repression of millions of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in
Xinjiang raises profound questions of conscience in particular for Muslim-majority countries in
the Middle East and around the world. In the long term, China seeks to increase its economic
and security influence in the region at the expense of the United States.105
Beijing’s reliance on oil imports from the Middle East has grown tremendously in the last
two decades, rising from 0.33 million barrels per day in 1998 to just over 4 million barrels
per day in 2018.106
Meanwhile, the PLA Navy visits the region with an eye to developing
deep-water ports like that of Salalah in Oman. China also wants to expand military sales —
for example, Chinese defense companies sell unmanned aerial vehicles at cut-rate prices with
little-to-no regard for nonproliferation107
— and expand security cooperation with regional
states in other ways. This undermines U.S. defense companies. It also endangers regional
partners’ access to U.S. military networks, eroding U.S. military interoperability and other
forms of security cooperation.
China sees a particularly appealing target for the Belt and Road Initiative in Israel, which
possesses an innovative high-tech economy with few barriers to entry.108
Perhaps the most
controversial of several projects underway is the Shanghai International Port Group’s partial
construction and operation of a new terminal at the Haifa port, which also serves as the strategic
port for the U.S. Navy 6th
Fleet. If Chinese workers obtain “high levels of access to potentially
sensitive commercial or military information,” the United States will face surveillance and
cyber-espionage risks.109
In Africa, the PRC is bent on acquiring vast amounts of the continent’s abundant raw
materials and mineral wealth to provide Chinese manufacturing with key components while
disadvantaging companies in the United States and allied countries. Largely debt-financed,
23
China’s projects in Africa often fail to meet reasonable international standards of sustainability
and transparency, and burden local economies with heavy debt and other problems.110
China
also expands its influence in African states by aggressively cultivating high-level relationships.
For example, General Secretary Xi, China’s premier, and China’s foreign minister collectively
made 79 visits to Africa between 2007 and 2017.111
At the same time, African nationals who
work in the PRC frequently face racism and discrimination, a problem that drew international
outrage amid Beijing’s domestic reaction to the novel coronavirus.112
In 2017, China established in Djibouti its first foreign military base. The base looks out on
the Bab-el-Mandeb Straits in the Gulf of Aden, through which passes nearly 10 percent of the
world’s total seaborne-traded petroleum. This comprises 6.2 billion barrels per day of crude
oil, condensate, and refined petroleum.113
Together with China’s anti-piracy activities in the
Gulf of Aden and growing presence in the Gulf of Guinea, the base has extended China’s
military reach off Africa’s coasts and into the Indian Ocean.114
Western Hemisphere
China’s geopolitical influence stretches deep into America’s backyard. Beijing accelerated
bilateral trade investment in Latin America after the 2008 financial crisis to acquire extensive
stakes in the region’s petroleum, mining, and energy sectors. China’s Huawei and ZTE are
among the region’s top providers of telecommunications equipment and networks as well as of
surveillance architectures — all of which pose espionage risks.115
In addition, Beijing pursues
nuclear contracts in Brazil and Argentina, not only furnishing preliminary financing but also,
in Argentina’s case, offering a slush fund of more than $2 billion for use as the government sees
fit.116
Meanwhile, poorer Latin American countries export commodities and foodstuffs to the
PRC while importing increasingly high-value Chinese manufacturing and technology goods.
Loaning far more than it invests, the PRC often requires Latin American countries to repay
in commodities, yielding resource security for China while incentivizing corruption abroad.
As the world’s biggest oil importer, China regards Venezuela — possessor of the world’s largest
oil reserves — as an important partner. The PRC began lending to Venezuela through “loansfor-oil”
agreements with former President Hugo Chavez.117
The largest recipient in South
24
America of Chinese official finance, Venezuela has accepted more than $60 billion in loans
from the China Development Bank (CDB) since 2007 in exchange for future oil shipments.118
In addition, Beijing takes advantage of the Western Hemisphere to further its ambitions in
outer space. China has conducted nearly a dozen satellite launches from Latin American states
and operates space observatories in Chile and a deep-space radar in Argentina.119
The United States and Canada are by no means exempt from China’s influence operations.120
The PRC targets key U.S. technological and economic sectors — at the national, state, and local
levels — using cyberattacks, theft, and other methods to transfer to China valuable information,
data, and technology. In Canada, where the government has yet to make a final decision on
5G vendors, Huawei partners with companies to bring high-speed internet access to remote
communities. The United States and Canada also rely on China as a supplier for a number
of critical minerals. At the same time, China’s state-owned and state-directed companies —
including those sanctioned by the United States and linked to China’s military modernization,
espionage, and human rights abuses — enjoy active and passive investment from a number
of public pension funds in U.S. states.121
As the price of doing business in China, the CCP
demands that American and Canadian businesses — from finance and industry to media and
professional sports — toe the party line, which companies often do. And the PRC exploits
consulates in the United States as platforms to steal American intellectual property.122
The PRC commits serious abuses in American higher education. Although in many cases
China obtains technological knowledge from the United States through legitimate and
productive academic exchanges, it also acquires such expertise illegally through the Thousand
Talents Program and other state-run or party-run recruitment efforts. Recent cases at the
University of Kansas and Harvard illustrate the dangers.123
Furthermore, while the United
States welcomes Chinese students to introduce them to the blessings of political freedom,
the CCP has an interest in conscripting Chinese nationals studying abroad to advance the
interests of communist dictatorship. Indeed, the PRC punishes Chinese students studying in
the United States for dissenting from official CCP views and for otherwise speaking freely.124
Universities’ financial dependence on tuition dollars from China complicates matters: in recent
years, American universities have intentionally admitted more Chinese nationals because they,
unlike many American students, pay ballooning tuition costs in full.125
At the graduate and
25
undergraduate levels, China sends more students to the United States than any other country.126
And Beijing uses Confucius Institutes not only to promulgate CCP-approved views about
China and the world but also to press U.S. universities to censor discussion, curtail inquiry,
and generally conform to CCP dogma and political objectives.127
Transforming International Organizations from Within
Beijing continues to throw its weight around at the United Nations and in other international
organizations to align these institutions with China’s transformative ambitions. China
generally delivers higher levels of development assistance to countries voting with it in the
UN General Assembly.128
As a veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council, the PRC
— in cooperation with Russia — has frustrated significant measures proposed by the United
States and European nations to address challenges in Syria, Ukraine, North Korea, Venezuela,
Iran, and elsewhere. To advance its revisionist agenda and counter U.S. efforts to promote
transparency and accountability, the PRC vigorously pursues leadership positions, using its
voting advantages as a member of the Group of 77 at the United Nations and in the NonAligned
Movement.129
A growing number of PRC citizens now serve as heads of international
organizations — including the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), International
Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), United Nations Industrial Development Organization
(UNIDO), and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) — and in other top-level leadership
and management positions at such organizations.130
China tries to insert into multilateral
documents communist language derived from so-called Xi Jinping Thought and references to
the Belt and Road Initiative and other signature efforts to give China’s communist propaganda
a UN imprimatur.131
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, China provided a dramatic illustration
of abuse of the international system, compelling the World Health Organization to comply
with Beijing’s self-serving preferences — including the exclusion of Taiwan.
Over the long run, the CCP views international organizations as an opportunity — to shield
the party’s abusive development practices and egregious human rights record from criticism,
and to gradually adjust global norms, standards, and institutions to advance its authoritarian
goals.
26
Conclusion
Viewed as a whole, the major components of China’s conduct — preservation of a MarxistLeninist
dictatorship; leveraging of the country’s wealth to produce economic dependence
and political subordination abroad and to reorient international organizations from within
around CCP criteria and goals; and development of a world-class military — reveal a great
power that sees the transformation of international order as critical to its plans to dominate
world affairs. The PRC’s interests and ambitions have not developed accidentally, nor do
they simply reflect China’s geopolitical circumstances. They give expression to ideas rooted
in 20th
-century communist ideology and the party’s extreme interpretation of Chinese
nationalism. These ideas are the intellectual sources of China’s conduct.
27
III. The Intellectual Sources of China’s Conduct
Many misunderstand the shape and significance of China’s conduct because they disregard
the Chinese Communist Party’s ideas about communism, about China, and about the
world. In the United States, this neglect of ideas is sometimes rooted in the supposition that
all governments want, or can be persuaded to want, the freedom for their people in which
the United States was conceived and to which it remains dedicated. At other times, the
neglect stems from an unrealistic internationalism that downplays power in politics or an
unrealistic geopolitical realism that discounts the political significance of opinion, culture,
and tradition. The China challenge demands a more reasonable approach, one that honors
principle in prudent judgment by taking seriously both interests and ideas.132
Instead of
imposing America’s self-image on China or foisting America’s preconceived notions about
international politics on world affairs, it is crucial to examine the CCP’s understanding of
its short-term priorities, long-term objectives, and rightful place among nations in order to
grasp how, and the purposes for which, the PRC exercises power.
It is reasonable to wonder to what extent CCP statements, speeches, and authoritative writings
are designed for domestic consumption — to preach to the faithful, to demonize dissenters,
and to define the full range of the regime’s supposed enemies — and to what extent they
reflect the party’s core convictions and essential thinking. But without examining them, one
cannot determine whether CCP statements, speeches, and authoritative writings are only
rhetorical weapons of great-power competition or also expressions of deep-seated beliefs
and abiding aims and aspirations. Such examination discloses a tight connection between
the CCP’s words and deeds. As John Garnaut argues. “There is no ambiguity in Xi’s project.
We see in everything he does and — even in a system designed to be opaque and deceptive —
we can see it in his words.133
China’s pursuit of global preeminence and drive to remake world order flow from the CCP’s
overarching sensibility. That sensibility is authoritarian, collectivist, and imperial. Two streams
of ideas nourish it. Seminal CCP writings and speeches proclaim cardinal tenets of MarxismLeninism
as interpreted by successive Chinese communist leaders beginning with Mao Zedong,
CCP chairman from 1943 to 1976 and the PRC’s founding ruler. CCP writings and speeches
28
also espouse an extreme interpretation of Chinese nationalism. The result is an ideological
stance that is neither strictly communist nor purely nationalist, but resolutely authoritarian,
collectivist, and imperialist.
Although both communism and nationalism are compatible with authoritarianism, collectivism,
and imperialism, communism and nationalism are generally seen as opposing ideologies.
Communism, as Marx taught, culminates in a single, worldwide, classless society. In pursuit
of that goal, communist parties have tended to be authoritarian, collectivist, and imperialist.
Nationalism emphasizes a particular people and its distinctive traditions and sense of political
destiny; it varies as customs, practices, and political experiences vary. Accordingly, national
traditions can be drawn on to justify repression and conquest but also to vindicate the claims
of freedom and democracy — as, for example, in the United States, whose founding principles
and constitutional system revolve around individual liberty, human equality, and government
grounded in the consent of the governed. The CCP reconciles the conflicting imperatives of
Marxism-Leninism and of its extreme interpretation of Chinese nationalism by assigning to
China the dominant role in reconfiguring and administering the international order to suit
the party’s authoritarian convictions and practices.
Neither the communist authoritarianism the CCP has imposed on the people in China nor
the party’s plans for reshaping world affairs are inevitable. Indeed, prominent alternatives to
CCP authoritarianism have prospered in the region. No less steeped in Confucian traditions
than the population of the People’s Republic of China, the people of Hong Kong, Taiwan,
and South Korea embraced freedom and democracy.
Nevertheless, because the Chinese Communist Party calls the shots in China, the party’s ideas
about communism must be well understood. So too must the traditional political ideas that
the party draws on be taken into account.134
Grasping both brings into focus the authoritarian,
collectivist, and imperial synthesis that drives the CCP’s conduct.
The CCP’s Communism
In 1954, Mao stated, “The force at the core that leads our cause is the Chinese Communist
29
 
Party; the theoretical foundation that guides our thinking is Marxism-Leninism.”135
Daniel
Tobin has underscored the continuity of the party’s ideological convictions: “In his first
speech to a Politburo group study session as general secretary in November 2012, Xi [Jinping]
echoed each of his post-Mao predecessors in insisting: ‘Only socialism can save China, and
only Chinese socialism can lead our country to development.’”136
And only socialism, from
the party’s point of view, can confer upon China its deserved role in world affairs. The CCP
aims to make China “a global leader in terms of power and global influence,” as Xi stated
in 2017, by strengthening socialism as its “path, theory, system, culture.” Following former
ChineseleaderDengXiaoping,Xicallsthisapproach“socialismwithChinesecharacteristics.”137
In governing China, the CCP adheres to familiar features of 20th
-century Marxism-Leninism.
The party is supreme. It acts on the assumption that the communist end sanctifies all means.
It absorbs the state, subordinating the individual to the collectivity. It directs the economy
(even as it permits a degree of private ownership and creates limited space for market forces).
It controls education, media, culture, and religion. It regularly purges counterrevolutionary
forces. It preaches the priority of socialism’s struggle to defeat international capitalism and
political freedom. It proclaims the inevitability of socialism’s victory, which, it maintains, the
scientific laws of social and economic development guarantee. And it promulgates among
the people a rigid ideology from which it tolerates no dissent.
Ideological indoctrination is among the party’s paramount concerns. The CCP imposes
conformity of thought and action, for example, through the Great Firewall of China, which
censors the internet, and a national “social credit” system that rewards good behavior and
punishes bad behavior. To control information and surveil the population, “Chinese authorities
are knitting together old and state-of-the-art technologies — phone scanners, facial-recognition
cameras, face and fingerprint databases and many others.”138
Meanwhile, Xi is determined to
put the power of the state behind the one and only legitimate understanding of economics,
politics, and international relations. “We will work harder to study and develop Marxist
theory,” he vowed in 2017. “We will foster a Marxist-style of learning, and make it regular
practice and an institutionalized requirement for all Party members….”139
In a landmark 1979 speech, Deng announced the Four Cardinal Principles, which distill the
CCP’s communist convictions: “1) We must keep to the socialist road; 2) We must uphold
30
the dictatorship of the proletariat; 3) We must uphold the leadership of the Communist Party;
4) We must uphold Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought.”140
In 1982, the CCP
wrote the Four Cardinal Principles into the PRC Constitution; the principles also form an
essential part of the party’s constitution. Since then, party leaders have emphasized that the
CCP’s loosening of state control of the economy in some areas beginning in the late 1970s
— a decisive factor in unleashing China’s economic potential and propelling China to greatpower
status — did not diminish China’s dedication to communism. In 2019, Xi lavishly
celebrated the 40th
anniversary of the declaration of the Four Cardinal Principles.141
Central to the CCP’s understanding of world affairs is the Marxist teaching that throughout
history human societies have been divided into an oppressed class and an oppressor class.
In the modern era, the emergence of two opposed economic and political systems dividing
the world heightens the contradiction. On one side, according to the Marxist view, stands
capitalism, with its fraudulent commitment to a political and economic freedom that inherently
exploits the individual. On the other side, Marxism teaches, stands communism, based on
central planning and the conscription of the people in service to the party, and devoted to
what communism believes to be true human emancipation.142
Xi embraces this Manichean view of world affairs. In 2013, shortly after he came to power,
the CCP issued “Document No. 9,” which enumerated seven perils to Chinese society
emanating from the West.143
These include constitutional democracy, human rights, free
speech, robust civic participation, and a vigorous free market. Daniel Tobin stresses that for
the CCP, “individual human rights, including freedom of speech, assembly, and religion are
to be subjugated in the name of the collective ends of security, development, and the Chinese
nation’s status in the world.”144
At the 19th
Party Congress in 2017, the CCP reaffirmed that
China offered a new model of socialism that would prevail in the great struggle with capitalism
and, by so doing, overcome the division between oppressor and oppressed and bring harmony
to world affairs. As some Central Party School scholars have noted, the party intends to replace
the post-World War II order which, in its view, is grounded in unjust Western political and
economic principles, with a new one rooted in the CCP’s socialism.145
Despite Xi’s promises
of “win-win” deals with the outside world, a recurring phrase from internal CCP directives
proclaims the encounter between capitalism and socialism to be a matter of “you die, I live.”
31
According to the CCP, the former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc communist countries
betrayed the cause, which compelled China to lead the struggle for socialism. Following the
dissolution of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s and the emergence of a post-Cold War
international order that welcomed fledgling Eastern European democracies, the CCP —
though governing the world’s most populous country — saw China as greatly outnumbered
in a perilous geopolitical environment.146
Since then, the accumulation of economic clout
and military power have fortified the CCP’s belief that China is socialism’s savior and herald
of an alternative world order.
Notwithstanding the CCP’s unswerving professions of fidelity to the fundamental tenets
of Marxism-Leninism, decisive features of the PRC’s conduct resist explanation in strictly
communist terms. The CCP’s determination to indoctrinate the nation with an extreme
theory of Chinese moral and institutional superiority is not drawn from the Marxism-Leninism
playbook.147
While communism aims to create a universal and classless international order,
the CCP seeks to export the Chinese model of authoritarian governance and create economic
dependence on Beijing in nation-states around the world. And whereas communism envisages
the eventual withering away of the state, the CCP has made a paramount national priority of
rectifying the indignities and injustices that it believes China has suffered at the hands of the
West — starting with the recovery of what the party asserts as the Chinese nation’s rightful
rule over Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the South China Sea.
These defining components of China’s conduct derive support from the CCP’s hypernationalist
convictions.
The CCP’s Chinese Nationalism
At no point in its long history has China embraced the idea — assumed by liberal democracies
and affirmed by the United Nations — of sovereign equality among nations grounded in respect
for rights inherent in all persons. Instead, traditional Chinese thinking about government
encompasses a strategic outlook that asserts China’s right and responsibility to rule the world
“under heaven” through the nation’s uniquely refined culture and institutions. This strategic
32
outlook also comprises views about China’s proper position in world affairs, the flow of history,
military strategy and tactics, economic power, and domestic political order.148
First, traditional Chinese thinking sees China as the “Middle Kingdom,” the central state
surrounded by lesser states.
Second, traditional Chinese thinking understands history cyclically. While the fortunes of
particular Chinese dynastic empires wax and wane, China remains at the center and deserving
of exalted status.
Third, traditional Chinese thinking is marked by a long view of military strategy and tactics.
Military power should be accumulated, stored, and showcased publicly but only to the extent
necessary to dissuade adversaries from compelling China to use it. Tactics revolve around the
slow, incremental acquisition of positions so that opponents only grasp after it’s too late that
they are surrounded and face overwhelming power with no reasonable choice but to submit.
Sometimes an opponent will suffer a crisis that creates “an auspicious moment” for striking
a decisive blow.
Fourth, traditional Chinese thinking views economic power as a primary component of
imperial power. China should use its advantages in size and excellence to convey to partners
in commerce the benefits of acquiescing to a China-dominated system.
Fifth,traditionalChinesethinkingfeaturesauthoritarianproclivities.Itischaracterizedbyastatism
that directs economics and society. It is home to a legalism that employs a strict penal code to
createthedomesticstabilitythatallowsforthebuildingofwealthandmilitarymight.Anditsees
politicalpowerasproperlyresidinginanelitebureaucracyratherthanspringingfrom the people.
This is not to deny the depth and crosscutting complexity of Chinese tradition and the richness
of the moral, philosophical, and religious ideas within it.149
Nor is it to suggest that freedom
and democracy cannot flourish in China, as they do in Taiwan and South Korea, and did in
Hong Kong. It is to observe, rather, that the CCP draws on certain prominent components
of traditional Chinese thinking about politics to bolster the conviction that authoritarian
government undergirds China’s manifest superiority and inherent centrality. That conviction
33
is as basic to the CCP’s self-understanding as is the communist dogma of intractable class
conflict until capitalism’s demise.
All of the CCP’s paramount leaders, from Mao to Xi, have affirmed China’s nationalist
prerogatives, envisaging China as the “big country” or “major country,” which should not
be resisted by “little countries.” In the early decades of CCP rule, however, China’s economy
was relatively small and weak. Because of the need to modernize and accumulate wealth
and power, Xi’s predecessors tended to balance Chinese assertiveness with accommodation
and compromise. Deng famously counseled that China should “bide its time, and hide its
capabilities.” Early in the post-Cold War era, the PRC’s growing engagement in regional
and international institutions — from the ASEAN Regional Forum to the World Trade
Organization — created an impression of moderation that encouraged the belief that Beijing
would play fair and sometime soon embrace the norms of freedom and democracy.
However, underneath PRC rhetoric lay the CCP’s steadfast belief in China’s status as the
“big country” and the need to protect the nation’s sovereignty against foreign influence. In the
1990s, former PLA Navy Chief Liu Huaqing repeatedly told his American counterparts that
the problem was not China, the big country, bullying the little countries, but the other way
around — that is, the little countries bullying the big country.150
“China is a big country and
other countries are little countries, and that’s just a fact,” China’s then-Foreign Minister Yang
Jiechi explained to his Singapore counterpart in 2010.151
Although insisting that China would
act benevolently toward “smaller countries” in the dispute over maritime claims in the South
China Sea, PRC Foreign Minister Wang Yi stated in March 2014 that “we will never accept
unreasonable demands from little countries.”152
Similarly, China’s state-run media — most
notably the jingoistic Global Times — justifies Beijing’s bellicosity toward its many neighbors
as “punitive” actions undertaken to teach the little countries to submit to the big country.153
Xi can be assertive because of the fruits of his predecessors’ patience and resolve, and because
of the failure of liberal democracies — for fear of damaging commercial relations with the
PRC — to put pressure on Beijing for bad behavior. China’s size and recently developed
strength enable Xi to energetically pursue “Big Country Diplomacy” (or “Major Country
Diplomacy”). Such diplomacy is bolstered by party propaganda and growing international
34
influence,154
and champions the nationalist privileges and prerogatives to which the CCP
remains dedicated.155
Even as the CCP proclaims China’s supremacy among nations and indoctrinates the people
with a belief in the PRC’s paramount status, the party has for decades fostered in China
an acute sense of historical victimhood and national shame. The CCP traces the nation’s
grievances to the concessions the British imposed on China in the mid-19th
-century Opium
Wars. While seeing itself as the rightful heir of China’s ancient and storied civilization, the
CCP resents the Qing dynasty’s failure to modernize, which it blames for China’s territorial
losses and other disgraces at the hands of Western imperial powers during the so-called “century
of humiliation” (1839-1949).156
Notwithstanding its destruction of major parts of China’s
magnificent cultural heritage, the CCP stokes popular indignation by promulgating the
belief that, for a protracted period, smaller and morally and intellectually inferior countries
deprived the Middle Kingdom of its rightful status. The refusal of the United States to
recognize China’s exalted position as the CCP understands it provides ammunition for the
party’s narrative of China as a victim.
For the CCP, pride in China’s inherent centrality and resentment at its mistreatment by
the West reinforce one another. This potent mix of pride and resentment nourishes party
members’ conviction that China is endowed with incontrovertible title to rule in a loose
system in which other countries enjoy considerable autonomy provided they recognize their
place and submit to Beijing’s geopolitical priorities. At the same time, the combination of
pride and resentment weakens the party’s inclination to compromise and cooperate. Built
around defeat at the hands of the West, the CCP’s founding myth disposes China to dwell
on settling old scores and righting historic wrongs.157
Xi’s Synthesis of Communism and Chinese Nationalism
All five Chinese Communist paramount leaders — Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin,
Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping — have affirmed the fundamental tenets of Marxism-Leninism
while adhering to an extreme interpretation of Chinese nationalism. A beneficiary of the
35
massive modernization campaign launched by Deng and stewarded by Jiang and Hu, Xi has
spoken most forcefully and openly about the union of communism and Chinese nationalism
in service to the CCP’s ambitions for global preeminence.
At the 19th
Party Congress in October 2017, the CCP amended its Party Constitution to
enshrine Xi’s concept of “the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation.”158
Xi emphasized
the fidelity of his synthesis of Chinese communism and Chinese nationalism to the party’s
fundamental teachings: “At its founding,” he said, “the Communist Party of China made
realizing communism its highest ideal and its ultimate goal, and shouldered the historic
mission of national rejuvenation.”159
The flourishing of the individual, according to the party, flows from the flourishing of the
nation. “History shows that the future and destiny of each and every one of us are closely
linked to those of our country and nation,” Xi said in a 2012 speech. “One can do well only
when one’s country and nation do well. Achieving the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation
is both a glorious and an arduous mission that requires the dedicated efforts of the Chinese
people one generation after another. Empty talk harms the country, while hard work makes
it flourish.”160
Individual and national flourishing, Xi emphasized in a 2019 speech, are indissolubly bound
up with the triumph of the nation, the party, and communist ideology: “In today’s China,
the essence of patriotism is the complete combination of our devotion to the country, to the
Chinese Communist Party and to socialism.”161
The patriotic work of national rejuvenation,
as Xi explains it, culminates with China’s global preeminence and transformation of the
international order from within.162
36
The party’s Constitution contains a passage known as the “basic line” that summarizes the
goal for national rejuvenation:
The basic line of the Communist Party of China in the primary stage of socialism is
to lead all the people of China together in a self-reliant and pioneering effort, making
economic development the central task, upholding the Four Cardinal Principles, and
remaining committed to reform and opening up, so as to see China become a great
modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced,
harmonious, and beautiful.163
Notwithstanding its brevity and seemingly anodyne language, the “basic line” captures the
mingling of communism and Chinese nationalism in the service of the CCP’s ambition to
prevail in great-power rivalry with the United States. Such terms as “democratic,” “harmonious,”
and “beautiful” appear compatible with government that protects rights, and which is
grounded in the consent of the people. However, the words reflect the CCP’s autocratic
intentions, alluding to Mao’s concept of “the people’s democratic dictatorship.” As a whole,
the basic line affirms the party’s comprehensive control of society and its conviction that the
United States heads an international capitalist conspiracy to prevent socialist China from
achieving global dominance.
In short, the “basic line” points to the CCP’s quest to make the Chinese nation the world’s
greatest power.164
The CCP set a deadline of 2049 — the PRC’s 100-year anniversary — for
achieving this national rejuvenation and has identified several steps to accomplish it.
First, China must complete the project of modernization by developing a world-leading
economy and world-class military. The economic, social, and political order necessary to
achieving this objective, according to the CCP, is socialism.
Second, China must overcome its “century of humiliation” by recovering what the CCP
views as lost territory and as its full maritime claims over littoral waters. The CCP’s 2017
Constitution states that the party “shall work continuously to strengthen the unity of all the
Chinese people, including compatriots in the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative
regions and in Taiwan as well as overseas Chinese.” It will also achieve “the reunification of the
37
motherland” — a euphemism for recovery of Taiwan — “in conformity with the principle of
‘one country, two systems.’”165
In his address to the 19th
Party Congress, Xi explicitly identifies
“achieving China’s reunification” as “essential to realizing national rejuvenation.”166
Third, China must achieve the dominant position in world politics. “In this long period of
cooperation and conflict, socialism must learn from the boons that capitalism has brought
to civilization,” Xi instructed the CCP in 2013. “Most importantly, we must concentrate our
efforts on bettering our own affairs, continually broadening our comprehensive national power,
improving the lives of our people, building a socialism that is superior to capitalism, and laying
the foundation for a future where we will win the initiative and have the dominant position.”167
To win the initiative and have the dominant position, China must displace the United States
as the world’s foremost power. Xi plans for China by 2049 to complete its emergence as “a
global leader in terms of composite national strength and international influence.”168
Fourth, socialism must culminate in the unification of humanity under Chinese leadership.
In his address to the 19th
Party Congress, Xi refers several times to a “community of common
destiny for mankind.”169
This notion figures extensively in China’s far-reaching efforts under
Xi to extend its global influence. In August 2018, top diplomat Yang Jiechi, director of the
CCP’s Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs and a Politburo member, went
so far as to assert, “Building a community of common destiny for mankind is the overall
goal of China’s foreign affairs work in the new era” and requires a “new type of international
relations.”170
Xi’s community of common destiny for mankind would replace the established
international order grounded in free and sovereign nation-states with a unity of nations in
shared deference to the CCP’s conception of international order.171
In a 2016 speech to a Politburo collective study session on global governance, Xi stressed the
need to “improve our ability to participate in global governance, and in particular, our ability
to make rules, set agendas, and carry out publicity and coordination.”172
Accordingly, Xi
exhorts PRC diplomats to “take an active part in leading the reform of the global governance
system.”173
Xi, however, does not envisage improvements in democratic accountability,
impartial administration, and fidelity to human rights. To the contrary, those essentials of
individual freedom and human equality must be defeated by implanting the CCP’s norms,
standards, and goals in international organizations.
38
The difference of opinion about the reform of world order between the United States and
China is stark. For the United States — and for fellow liberal democracies — the aim is to
preserve the freedom and sovereignty of nation-states by fortifying the established order,
which is grounded in respect for human rights and in fidelity to the rule of law, understood
as the impartial application of publicly disclosed, settled, and binding rules. For China, the
objective is to transform world order. The CCP seeks to reconfigure the community of nations
by placing China at the center while subordinating freedom, national sovereignty, human
rights, and the rule of law to the imperatives of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
Conclusion
China’s conduct flows from a distinctive blend of Marxism-Leninism and of the party’s extreme
version of Chinese nationalism. Viewing China’s conduct in the context of the CCP ideas
that inspire and shape it dispels the starry-eyed optimism about the PRC that has distorted
U.S. policy. It also encourages sobriety in cooperating with, containing, and deterring the
CCP. Grasping China’s conduct in light of the CCP’s governing ideas, moreover, illuminates
the vulnerabilities that afflict China’s authoritarian regime, and clarifies the tasks the United
States must undertake to secure freedom.
39
IV. China’s Vulnerabilities
After Mao Zedong’s disastrous Great Leap Forward (1958-1962) and bloody Cultural
Revolution (1966-1976), the Chinese Communist Party presided over great increases in
China’s industrial and technological capabilities, economic prosperity, and military power. The
PRC’s global reach and international influence have expanded accordingly. Notwithstanding
its progress in pursuit of national rejuvenation and the transformation of the international
order, the PRC’s vulnerabilities have also grown under the CCP’s watch.
Some of China’s vulnerabilities derive from the nature of autocracy.174
For want of freedom,
autocracies tend to struggle to maintain economies that over the long term can adapt, innovate,
and grow. Because of their imperial ambitions and disdain for international norms and
standards, autocracies make poor friends and are prone to estranging allies and partners. And
because of the need to repress their own citizens, autocracies typically must divert resources
from military affairs abroad to the preservation of order at home.
In addition to the vulnerabilities that inhere in all autocracies, the CCP’s blend of communism
and hyper-nationalism along with the country’s particular circumstances expose China to a
variety of specific vulnerabilities.
First, China’s economy faces significant difficulties. Although China is a global manufacturing
and technological powerhouse, Premier of the State Council Li Keqiang conceded in May
2020, “There are still some 600 million people earning a medium or low income, or even less….
Their monthly income is barely 1,000 yuan (about $142), not even enough to rent a room in
a medium-tier Chinese city.”175
The pandemic has compounded the problem by increasing
unemployment. Before the COVID-19 crisis, moreover, social unrest in the PRC percolated
as the economy experienced its lowest growth rate in 30 years.176
The new reality compels the
CCP to adopt more stringent measures to control the population.177
Several forms of dependence could hinder the sustained and substantial economic growth that
supports the CCP’s popular legitimacy. The CCP plans to overcome its reliance on exports
by bringing the 600 million or so Chinese who live on modest wages into the middle class.
Nevertheless, in the short term Beijing must export manufactured goods to consumers in the
40
United States and other advanced industrial nations to keep factories running and people
working even as, particularly in the wake of the global pandemic, the United States and others
seek to reduce reliance on Chinese manufacturing.178
Notwithstanding the CCP’s lagging
efforts to establish the yuan as a global reserve currency, China depends on the American
dollar to settle many international transactions. And China’s advanced manufacturing relies
on sophisticated microchips and other high-value technological goods from the United States
and other advanced industrial nations.179
This leaves critical sectors of China’s economy
vulnerable to temporary disruption by foreign governments’ imposition of export controls.180
Furthermore, while the extent in China of the economic contraction caused by COVID-
19 is uncertain, the pandemic’s consequences are bound to exceed what Beijing endured in
the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. Stimulus measures stretching across more than a
decade have taken their toll on China’s corporate sector while saddling the government with
immense debt.181
In response, China has imposed strict lending standards on its banks, the
efficacy of which is to be determined.182
While many Chinese companies depend on capital
markets in the United States, Britain, and other countries, some use secondary listings in
Hong Kong or Shanghai to insulate themselves from limitations on access to foreign capital
markets.183
Meanwhile, China’s manufacturing sector is likely to keep contracting due to
sharp drops in consumer demand at home and abroad. Declining manufacturing, diminished
consumption, and limited stimulus tools would depress GDP and increase unemployment,184
yielding further dissatisfaction and social unrest.185
A booming Chinese economy creates its own vulnerabilities. While the last several decades
show that greater economic freedom does not guarantee political liberalization, China’s
powerful economic engine, combining choice with state command and control, may still
encourage a frame of mind within the middle class and upper-middle class that is at odds
with authoritarian government. The opportunity to choose that a growing economy fosters
and the prosperity it unleashes tend to produce a taste for more freedom. Making decisions
about work and property can increase citizens’ expectations for choice in other realms while
producing greater affluence. Choice and affluence, moreover, tend to heighten the demand
for the protection of the fruits of one’s labor through property rights and laws that are settled,
public, and fairly applied. Alternatively, as some have argued, middle- and upper-middle-class
41
urbanites may continue to support the CCP because of the comfort and wealth they have
achieved under the party’s dominion even while dissatisfaction mounts among the hundreds
of millions of rural citizens whom economic development has left behind.186
Either way,
continued economic growth as much as economic stagnation could spur a destabilizing
demand in China for government accountability and for greater protection for basic rights
and fundamental freedoms.
Second, China suffers from worsening demographic conditions. The size of the population
is on track to peak in the coming decade and then gradually decline. To make matters worse,
Beijing is about to experience an explosion of those 65 and above while its working-age
population shrinks sharply. The absence in China of a modern social-safety net will impose
strains as workers struggle to support a steadily growing retiree population. In addition, as a
consequence of China’s one-child policy — abolished in 2016 but with consequences that will
reverberate for generations — China’s working-age population will suffer from a prolonged
gender imbalance (the 2010 census reported 120 males for every 100 females).187
Third, China’s accelerated economic development has severely degraded the environment.
For more than a decade the PRC has been, and remains, the world’s largest source of carbon
emissions. Pollution produces dystopian conditions in many of China’s major cities while
reducing the country’s arable land and clean water. As a consequence, life expectancy in China
has been falling.188
A recent Lancet study found that every year 1.1 million people in China
die prematurely due to air pollution.189
Fourth, corruption — at the local level as well as in the party’s upper echelons — creates
risks for the CCP. Many members of the elite have enriched themselves at the expense of the
people. Along with uneven economic growth and demographic and environmental problems,
repression and land expropriation exacerbate discontent, provoking more than 130,000 protests
of varying types annually. Such protests are likely to shake the system for years to come.190
Fifth, the CCP devotes considerable resources to the repression of ethnic and religious
minorities. In gross violation of the principles set forth in the 1948 Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, the CCP maintains a military occupation of Tibet that dates to the 1950s,
conducts a brutal program in Xinjiang to “re-educate” Uyghurs and millions of other Turkic
42
Muslims, subjugates Tibetans, oppresses ethnic Mongolians in China’s Inner Mongolian
Autonomous Region, and imposes onerous regulations on China’s Christians.191
Sixth, Beijing allocates extraordinary sums to internal security. The PRC refers to these expenses,
which include central-government and regional-level costs, as “national domestic security
spending.” One open-source analysis suggests that China directs approximately 18% more
to internal security than to external defense.192
PRC spending on national domestic security
grew from 348.6 billion RMB ($57.2 billion) in 2007 to 1.24 trillion RMB in 2017 ($197
billion in nominal dollars). These estimates “exclude billions of dollars spent on security-related
urban-management and surveillance initiatives” even as China’s lower wages and costs “render
Chinese security capabilities much higher per dollar spent” than U.S. security spending.193
Seventh, China’s military lacks popular legitimacy. The PLA’s purpose is to fight for the
CCP, not the people. Consistent with Mao’s motto, “political power grows out of the
barrel of a gun,” the party presides over military decision-making. Nevertheless, as the PLA
has modernized, ideological conviction within the ranks has declined while corruption has
increased. Xi has sought to restore party allegiance — more specifically, allegiance to him — by
reinstituting mandatory ideological training and purging the military’s most senior generals.194
The “re-redding” that the PLA must frequently undergo highlights the tension between the
party’s need for a professional military and its demand for unquestioned loyalty.195
Eighth, the CCP faces questions about leadership succession. Uncertainty surrounds the
person who will follow Xi Jinping as China’s paramount leader. The party’s practices under
Xi have diverged from the CCP’s norms for leadership succession established after Deng
Xiaoping. Whereas in the past, the party would have given some indication at this point in
the paramount leader’s tenure as to his successor, that question remains under Xi shrouded
in mystery. 196
Ninth, China’s conduct of foreign affairs generates distrust abroad. According to an October
2020 Pew Research Center survey, “Views of China have grown more negative in recent years
across many advanced economies, and unfavorable opinion has soared over the past year.”197
Before the global pandemic, Beijing faced a backlash from foreign capitals springing from its
authoritarian schemes of economic co-optation and coercion, rejection of norms of fairness
43
and reciprocity, and egregious human rights abuses. The global pandemic has amplified
international discontent with the PRC. The new coronavirus that emerged in Wuhan in late
2019 quickly spread to peoples and nations around the globe, in part because China concealed
the outbreak from the world. Beijing further damaged its reputation through its international
campaign of disinformation, and its “wolf warrior” diplomacy to deflect responsibility for
the pandemic. The CCP’s shameful misconduct — major factors in producing a known
worldwide death toll that has recently surpassed 1.5 million with ruinous consequences for
societies and economies around the globe — has given rise to international demands for
accountability over the spread of COVID-19.198
Conclusion
The CCP confronts a classic dilemma of authoritarian government: the more the party employs
repressive means to perpetuate its monopoly on state power, the more it risks driving a wedge
between itself and the people. At the same time, and even as hundreds of millions in China
remain mired in poverty, hundreds of millions have attained middle-class affluence under
the CCP. To what extent the delivery of economic growth, the manipulation of nationalist
sentiments, and the generation of fear and submission by a totalitarian surveillance state will
enable the CCP to retain its hold on power remains to be seen.
It also remains to be seen to what extent the CCP can address effectively the variety of
specific vulnerabilities China confronts. The party’s discipline and ruthlessness have enabled
it to marshal vast resources and patiently pursue the production of wealth at home and the
acquisition of power and influence abroad. At the same time, the CCP’s authoritarianism,
which eradicates dissent, constrains the party’s ability to recognize the regime’s weaknesses,
correct errors, and adjust to changing circumstances.199
Along with knowledge of China’s conduct and its intellectual sources, understanding of the
CCP’s vulnerabilities — not least the limitations of its ability to address its vulnerabilities —
must inform U.S. efforts to meet the China challenge.
44
V. Securing Freedom
Following the Chinese Communist Party’s massacre of civilians that ended the six-week
Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 and Beijing’s subsequent imposition of harsh restrictions
on freedom of speech and press, U.S. administrations of both parties doubled down on a
China policy focused on engagement. That policy had its justifications and brought its benefits.
However, rapid modernization, prodigious economic growth and steady integration into the
world economy, and the building of a world-class military have not inclined China to join, let
alone play its part in maintaining, the community of nations dedicated to an international
order grounded in freedom, democracy, national sovereignty, human rights, and the rule of law.
To the contrary, having survived the 1989 protests, the CCP proceeded to build a hyper-modern
police state based on repression and indoctrination at home and committed to predatory
schemes of international trade, investment, construction, surveillance, and disinformation.
Rather than yielding political liberalization, China’s outsized economic development and
acquisition of international influence have given new life among the party’s faithful to
achieving global preeminence and, in the process, reshaping world order to conform to the
CCP’s authoritarian priorities. Xi Jinping’s resolute pursuit of “the Chinese dream of national
rejuvenation” has intensified the great-power competition launched by the CCP.
In one crucial respect, the China challenge resembles the one presented by the Soviet Union
to the free world. Soviet authoritarianism combined communism and traditional Russian
nationalism.200
The Soviet synthesis governed the USSR’s quest to construct a world order
with Moscow at the center. Similarly, Chinese authoritarianism combines communism and
a hyper-nationalist interpretation of China’s status and destiny. The CCP synthesis governs
China’s quest to construct a world order with Beijing at the center.
In another crucial respect, however, the China challenge differs from the Soviet challenge.
The Soviet Union primarily enlarged its dominions and sought to impose its will through
military coercion. For almost fifty years, the USSR ruled over half of Europe through force
of arms and extended its global influence by means of weapons sales, security expertise, troop
deployments, proxy fighting forces, and the installation and propping up of Marxist regimes.
45
In contrast, the China challenge is not in the first place a military struggle. China’s saber
rattling in the South China Sea and gradual acquisition of positions, its crushing of freedom
in Hong Kong, and its menacing statements about and behavior toward Taiwan are of major
concern. The CCP’s conventional military is a force to be reckoned with. And Beijing’s
nuclear, cyber, and space capabilities pose substantial threats. Nevertheless, China primarily
pursues the reconfiguration of world affairs through a kind and quantity of economic power
of which the Soviets could only have dreamed.
The harsh reality is that to advance vital U.S. interests and defend cherished American principles,
the United States must maintain cooperative relations with a great power whose economy
represents a hefty component of world commerce but whose systematic conduct deprives
its own people of freedom and threatens the freedom of nations around the world. The
China challenge, so understood, is likely to dominate American foreign policy across many
administrations.
Meeting a challenge of such urgency, scope, and complexity requires the United States to
return to the fundamentals. To secure freedom, America must refashion foreign policy in
light of ten tasks.
First, the United States must secure freedom at home. The nation must preserve the
constitutional order, which is grounded in respect for individual rights, democratic selfgovernment,
and national sovereignty. The nation must also foster a growing economy based
on a free market that rewards hard work and entrepreneurship and ensures equal opportunity
while both making accommodations for those hit hardest by globalization’s disruptions and
devising incentives to equip individuals to prosper in industries crucial to U.S. security. And
the country must cultivate a vibrant civil society that enables people to care for their families,
safeguard their communities, and form associations of all sorts. Fidelity to America’s traditions
of individual freedom and democratic self-government will produce the prosperity and restore
the civic concord that have always been essential to meeting the nation’s challenges abroad.
Second, the United States must maintain the world’s most powerful, agile, and technologically
sophisticated military while enhancing security cooperation, grounded in common interests
and shared responsibility, with allies and partners. A strong military depends on a strong
46
economy — to provide the resources to train and maintain troops, to purchase the best
equipment, and to conduct the research and development to produce the next generation of
state-of-the-art weapons. At the same time, a strong economy depends on a strong military
— to ensure the open seas, safe skies, and secure communications networks that enable
international commerce to thrive. For the sake of security and prosperity, moreover, the
United States must rededicate itself to preserving its status as the world’s leader in technological
innovation. Since neither security nor prosperity can be achieved by one country alone, the
United States must regard the cultivation of allies and partners with whom it can share
responsibilities as a strategic imperative.
Third, the United States must fortify the free, open, and rules-based international order —
which it led in creating after World War II — composed of sovereign nation-states and based
on respect for human rights and the rule of law. Such an order reflects American principles
and serves American interests.
Fourth, the United States must reevaluate its alliance system and the panoply of international
organizations in which it participates to determine where they fortify the free, open, and rulesbased
international order and where they fall short. A thorough assessment is long overdue.
Fifth, in light of that assessment, the United States must strengthen its alliance system by
more effectively sharing responsibilities with friends and partners and by forming a variety
of groupings and coalitions to address specific threats to freedom. At the same time, in
cooperation with the world’s democracies and other like-minded partners, the United States
must reform international organizations where possible and, where necessary, build new
ones rooted in the underlying principles of the established international order. To those
ends, the United States must not only share responsibility for peace and security but also
must work with friends and partners to reconfigure supply chains to eliminate dependence
on China for critical materials and goods; to devise common standards for trade, technology,
communications, travel, and health; and, building on such initiatives as the International
Development Finance Corporation and the emerging Blue Dot Network, to invest in friendly
nations’ physical and digital infrastructure and commercial ventures, especially in the IndoPacific
region, the countries of which China most immediately threatens.
47
Sixth, the United States must promote American interests by looking for opportunities to
cooperate with Beijing subject to norms of fairness and reciprocity, constraining and deterring
the PRC when circumstances require, and supporting those in China who seek freedom.
Strategic competition with China requires delicate balancing: The United States must engage
with Beijing cautiously and creatively while countering China’s economic imperialism and
military adventurism and firmly opposing the brazen violations of the rule of law and the
gross human rights abuses that seem to be inseparable from CCP rule.
Seventh, the United States must educate American citizens about the scope and implications
of the China challenge. Only an informed citizenry can be expected to back the complex
mix of demanding policies that will enable the United States to secure freedom. Executivebranch
officials and members of Congress must address the public regularly and forthrightly
about China’s conduct and intentions, and about the policies the U.S. government must
implement to secure freedom at home and preserve the established international order. In
addition, the State Department, Congress, think tanks, and private sector organizations must
work together to ensure that government officials as well as the public have access to Englishlanguage
translations of CCP officials’ major speeches and writings along with important
publications and broadcasts from China’s state-run domestic media, scholarly community,
and worldwide propaganda machine.
Eighth, the United States must train the rising generation of government officials and publicpolicy
thinkers to navigate the new era of threats and opportunities. Not only diplomats but
also military strategists, economists, technologists, political theorists and more who deal with
China must be well-versed in the country’s language, culture (including moral, philosophical,
and religious traditions), and history (including politics, economics, and war). The same goes
for the training of the next generation in the languages, cultures, and histories of other strategic
competitors, as well as of friends and potential friends across the globe. It is not enough to
acquire a passing familiarity with critical languages or even a working knowledge. The pressing
and intricate problems of world politics require the U.S. government to recruit and cultivate
officials who have mastered critical languages — that it, who are capable of reading documents,
giving talks, and conducting the affairs of state in the languages spoken by strategic rivals as
well as by friends and partners. The State Department has recently expanded programs that
48
promote the serious study of Mandarin. It must also make a priority of accelerating training
in Russian, Hindi, Persian, Arabic, and other languages. At the same time, Congress must
create new programs to encourage students of all ages to achieve fluency in critical languages
and to use their skills in public service.
Ninth, the United States must reform American education to enable students to shoulder
the enduring responsibilities of citizenship in a free and democratic society and to meet
the special demands of a complex, globalized, information-age economy. Sinister efforts
from abroad seek to sow discord in the United States. And America’s grade schools, middle
schools, high schools, and colleges and universities have to a dismaying degree abandoned
well-rounded presentations of America’s founding ideas and constitutional traditions in favor
of propaganda aimed at vilifying the nation. In the face of these polarizing forces, the United
States must reclaim its own legacy of liberty. That begins with renewing appreciation of the
enduring principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence — that all are endowed
with unalienable rights, that the principal purpose of government is to secure those rights, and
that all legitimate political power springs from the consent of the governed. It also depends on
serious study of the history of America’s efforts down to the present day to live up to those
principles, not least through the establishment and preservation of a constitution of limited
powers. This will enable American citizens to grasp the nation’s interest in maintaining an
international order that favors free and sovereign nation-states. At the same time, the United
States must rededicate itself to the promotion of excellence in science, technology, engineering,
and mathematics. Rather than directing the economy in the manner of authoritarian regimes,
the United States government must supercharge the economy in the spirit of freedom and
opportunity by funding a variety of educational programs that promote mastery of STEM
subjects so that 21st
-century America leads the world in innovation, entrepreneurship, and
production.
Tenth, the United States must champion the principles of freedom — principles that are at
once universal and at the heart of the American national spirit — through example; speeches;
educational initiatives; public diplomacy; foreign assistance and investment; sanctions in
49
more difficult circumstances as well as other forms of non-military pressure; and, where the
nation’s vital interests are at stake and all else has failed, military force.
Grounded in the nation’s founding principles and constitutional traditions; invigorated by
a bustling economy; undergirded by the world’s best-trained and best-equipped military;
served by government officials who understand the American people and the American
political system, recognize the diversity and common humanity of the peoples and nations of
the world, and appreciate the complex interplay of ideas and interests in foreign affairs; and
fortified by an informed and engaged citizenry — this multi-pronged approach will enable
the United States to secure freedom.
50
Endnotes
1
For another turn to authoritative assumptions and governing ideas to explain the conduct of a great-power
rival, see George Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” February 22, 1946, https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu//coldwar/
documents/episode-1/kennan.htm; and “X” (George F. Kennan), “The Sources of Soviet Conduct,” Foreign
Affairs, Vol 25, No. 4 (July 1947), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russian-federation/1947-07-01/
sources-soviet-conduct.
2
Commission on Unalienable Rights, Report of the Commission on Unalienable Rights, U.S. Department of
State, August 2020, https://www.state.gov/report-of-the-commission-on-unalienable-rights/.
3
Daniel J. Tobin, “How Xi Jinping’s ‘New Era’ Should Have Ended U.S. Debate on Beijing’s
Ambitions,” Center for Strategic & International Studies, May 8, 2020, https://www.csis.org/analysis/
how-xi-jinpings-new-era-should-have-ended-us-debate-beijings-ambitions.
4
On constructive engagement with China and later efforts to encourage China to become a “responsible
stakeholder,” see “Clinton Defends ‘Constructive Engagement’ of China,” CNN, October 24, 1997,
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1997/10/24/clinton.china/; President William J. Clinton,
“Expanding Trade, Projecting Values: Why I’ll Fight to Make China’s Trade Status Permanent,” The New
Democrat, January 1, 2000, https://web.archive.org/web/20060215200454/http://www.dlc.org/ndol_
ci.cfm?kaid=108&subid=127&contentid=965; Deputy Secretary of State Robert B. Zoellick, “Whither
China: From Membership to Responsibility?” speech to the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations,
New York, NY, September 21, 2005, https://2001-2009.state.gov/s/d/former/zoellick/rem/53682.htm;
President George W. Bush, National Security Strategy, White House, March 2006, https://georgewbushwhitehouse.archives.gov/nsc/nss/2006/;
and President Barack H. Obama, National Security Strategy,
White House, May 2010, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/national_
security_strategy.pdf. For a thoughtful critique of this persuasion, see James Mann, The China Fantasy:
Why Capitalism Will Not Bring Democracy to China (New York, NY: Penguin, 2008), esp. pp. 69-88 and
101-112.
5
Francis Fukuyama, “The End of History,” The National Interest, No. 16 (Summer 1989), https://www.
jstor.org/stable/24027184?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents. For a critical view, see Azar Gat, “The
Return of Authoritarian Great Powers,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 86, No. 4 (July/August 2007), https://
www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2007-07-01/return-authoritarian-great-powers.
6
DanielJ.Tobin,preparedtestimonyforhearingon“A‘ChinaModel?’Beijing’sPromotionofAlternativeGlobal
Norms and Standards,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, March 13, 2020, pp. 4-6,
https://www.uscc.gov/hearings/china-model-beijings-promotion-alternative-global-norms-and-standards.
7
See, for example, Paul Heer, “Understanding the Challenge from China,” Asan Forum, April 3, 2018,
http://www.theasanforum.org/understanding-the-challenge-from-china/; Michael D. Swaine, “The U.S.
Can’t Afford to Demonize China,” Foreign Policy, June 29, 2018, https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/06/29/
the-u-s-cant-afford-to-demonize-china/; M. Taylor Fravel, J. Stapleton Roy, Michael D. Swaine, Susan A.
Thornton, and Ezra Vogel, “China is Not an Enemy,” opinion, Washington Post, July 3, 2019, https://www.
washingtonpost.com/opinions/making-china-a-us-enemy-is-counterproductive/2019/07/02/647d49d0-
9bfa-11e9-b27f-ed2942f73d70_story.html; and Fareed Zakaria, “The New China Scare,” Foreign Affairs,
Vol. 99, No. 1 (January/February 2020), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2019-12-06/
new-china-scare.
8
RobertD.Blackwill,Trump’sForeignPoliciesareBetterthanTheySeem,CouncilSpecialReportNo.84,Council
on Foreign Relations, April 2019, https://www.cfr.org/report/trumps-foreign-policies-are-better-they-seem.
51
9
See, for example, James Mann, The China Fantasy: Why Capitalism Will Not Bring Democracy to China;
Aaron Friedberg, A Contest for Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia (New York,
NY: Norton, 2011); Richard McGregor, The Party: The Secret World of China’s Communist Rulers (New
York, NY: Harper Perennial, 2012); Thomas J. Christensen, The China Challenge: Shaping the Choices of
a Rising Power (New York, NY: Norton, 2015); Michael Pillsbury, The Hundred Year-Marathon: China’s
Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower (New York, NY: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2016); James
Fallows, “China’s Great Leap Backwards,” The Atlantic, December 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/
magazine/archive/2016/12/chinas-great-leap-backward/505817/; Kurt M. Campbell and Ely Ratner, “The
China Reckoning,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 97, No. 2 (March/April 2018), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/
articles/china/2018-02-13/china-reckoning; Elizabeth Economy, The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the
New Chinese State (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2019); Larry Diamond and Orville Schell, eds.,
China’s Influence & American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution
Press, 2019), https://www.hoover.org/research/chinas-influence-american-interests-promoting-constructivevigilance;
David Goldman, “The Chinese Challenge,” Claremont Review of Books, Spring 2020, https://
claremontreviewofbooks.com/the-chinese-challenge/; Minxin Pei, “China’s Coming Upheaval,” Foreign
Affairs, Vol. 99, No. 3 (May/June 2020), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-04-03/
chinas-coming-upheaval; Michael R. Auslin, Asia’s New Geopolitics: Essays on Reshaping the Indo-Pacific
(Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2020); and H. R. McMaster, Battlegrounds: The Fight to Defend
the Free World (New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2020), pp. 89-149.
10
President Donald J. Trump, National Security Strategy, White House, December 2017, https://www.
whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/NSS-Final-12-18-2017-0905.pdf; Department of Defense,
Summary of the National Defense Strategy of the United States of America, October 2018, https://dod.defense.
gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/2018-National-Defense-Strategy-Summary.pdf; National Security Council,
United States Strategic Approach to the People’s Republic of China, White House, May 26, 2020, https://
www.whitehouse.gov/articles/united-states-strategic-approach-to-the-peoples-republic-of-china/; Office
of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China:
2020, annual report to Congress, U.S. Department of Defense, September 2020, https://media.defense.
gov/2020/Sep/01/2002488689/-1/-1/1/2020-DOD-CHINA-MILITARY-POWER-REPORT-FINAL.
PDF; and National Security Advisor Robert C. O’Brien, ed., Trump on China: Putting America First, White
House, November 2020, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Trump-on-ChinaPutting-America-First.pdf.
See also Vice President Mike Pence, “Remarks by Vice President Pence on the
Administration’s Policy Toward China,” speech at the Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C., October 4, 2018,
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-vice-president-pence-administrations-policytoward-china/;
Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo, “The China Challenge,” speech at the Hudson Institute,
Washington, D.C., October 30, 2019, https://www.state.gov/the-china-challenge/; Secretary Pompeo,
“U.S. States and the China Competition,” speech at the National Governors Association, Washington,
D.C., February 8, 2020, https://www.state.gov/u-s-states-and-the-china-competition/; Deputy National
Security Advisor Matt Pottinger, “Remarks by Deputy National Security Advisor Matt Pottinger to the
Miller Center at the University of Virginia,” speech, May 4, 2020, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-
statements/remarks-deputy-national-security-advisor-matt-pottinger-miller-center-university-virginia/;
National Security Advisor O’Brien, “The Chinese Communist Party’s Ideology and Global Ambitions,”
speech, Phoenix, AZ, June 24, 2020, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/chinese-communistpartys-ideology-global-ambitions/;
FBI Director Christopher Wray, “The Threat Posed by the Chinese
Government and the Chinese Communist Party to the Economic and National Security of the United
States,” speech at a video event of the Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C., July 7, 2020, https://www.fbi.
gov/news/speeches/the-threat-posed-by-the-chinese-government-and-the-chinese-communist-party-to-
52
 
the-economic-and-national-security-of-the-united-states; Attorney General William P. Barr, “Transcript
of Attorney General Barr’s Remarks on China Policy at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum,” speech,
Grand Rapids, MI, July 17, 2020, https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/transcript-attorney-general-barrs-remarks-china-policy-gerald-r-ford-presidential-museum;
Secretary Pompeo, “Communist China and
the Free World’s Future, speech at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, Yorba Linda,
CA, July 23, 2020, https://www.state.gov/communist-china-and-the-free-worlds-future/; and Secretary
Pompeo, “State Legislatures and the China Challenge,” speech at the Wisconsin State Capitol, Madison,
WI, September 23, 2020, https://www.state.gov/state-legislatures-and-the-china-challenge/.
11
James R. Kurth, The American Way of Empire: How America Won a World But Lost Her Way (Washington,
DC:WashingtonBooks,2019),pp.240-247.SeealsoH.R.McMaster,“HowChinaSeestheWorld,”TheAtlantic,
May 2020, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/05/mcmaster-china-strategy/609088/.
12
Xi Jinping, “Uphold and Develop Socialism with Chinese Characteristics,” speech to the
CCP Central Committee, January 5, 2013, in Tanner Greer, trans., “Xi Jinping in Translation:
China’s Guiding Ideology,” Palladium, May 31, 2019, https://palladiummag.com/2019/05/31/
xi-jinping-in-translation-chinas-guiding-ideology/.
13
For authoritative U.S. sources on China’s human rights record, see the respective annual reports of the
U.S. Department of State’s Country Reports on Human Rights Practices and the Congressional-Executive
Commission on China (CECC). The U.S. Department of State’s entry on China in the annual Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices is available at https://www.state.gov/reports-bureau-of-democracyhuman-rights-and-labor/country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/.
Congress created the CECC in
October 2000 with the statutory mandate to monitor human rights and the development of the rule of law
in China, and to submit an annual report to the President and the Congress. The CECC’s annual reports
are available at https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports.
14
Adrian Zenz, “New Evidence for China’s Political Re-Education Campaign in Xinjiang,” Jamestown
Foundation, May 15, 2018, https://jamestown.org/program/evidence-for-chinas-political-re-educationcampaign-in-xinjiang/;
Austin Ramzy and Chris Buckley, “‘Absolutely No Mercy’: Leaked Files Expose
How China Organized Mass Detentions of Muslims,” The New York Times, November 16, 2019, https://
www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html; Sui-Lee Wee and
Paul Mozur, “China Uses DNA to Map Faces, With Help From the West,” The New York Times, December
3, 2019 (updated December 10, 2019), https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/03/business/china-dna-uighursxinjiang.html;
“China Cuts Uighur Births With IUDs, Abortion, Sterilization,” Associated Press, June 29,
2020, https://apnews.com/269b3de1af34e17c1941a514f78d764c; Thomas Lum and Michael A. Weber,
“Uyghurs in China,” CRS Report No. IF10281, Congressional Research Service, updated July 13, 2020,
p. 1, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10281; Helen Davidson, “Thousands of Xinjiang
Mosques Destroyed or Damaged, Report Finds,” The Guardian, September 25, 2020, https://www.
theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/25/thousands-of-xinjiang-mosques-destroyed-damaged-china-reportfinds;
and Mark Mittelhauser, “Goods from Xinjiang: Tarnished by Forced Labor,” U.S. Department of
Labor, October 5, 2020, https://blog.dol.gov/2020/10/05/goods-from-xinjiang-tarnished-by-forced-labor.
15
Specific repressive measures include an elevated police presence within monasteries; ideological re-education
of Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns; arbitrary detention and prosecution of Tibetans; tight surveillance
and censorship; and increased restrictions on the use of the Tibetan language in schools. For more, see
Human Rights Watch, “Relentless: Detention and Prosecution of Tibetans Under China’s ‘Stability
Maintenance’ Campaign,” May 22, 2016, https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/05/22/relentless/detentionand-prosecution-tibetans-under-chinas-stability-maintenance;
Chris Buckley, “A Tibetan Tried to Save
His Language. China Handed Him 5 Years in Prison,” The New York Times, May 22, 2018, https://www.
nytimes.com/2018/05/22/world/asia/tibetan-activist-tashi-wangchuk-sentenced.html; Thomas Lum and
53
Michael A. Weber, “Human Rights in China and U.S. Policy: Issues for the 116th
Congress,” CRS Report
No. R45956, Congressional Research Service, October 9, 2019, pp. 9-10, https://crsreports.congress.gov/
product/pdf/R/R45956; and U.S. Department of State, “Tibet,” in 2019 Country Reports on Human
Rights Practices, March 11, 2020, https://www.state.gov/reports/2019-country-reports-on-human-rightspractices/china/tibet/.
According to recent reporting, “More than 500,000 Tibetans have been transferred
to Chinese training centers since the beginning of 2020, as an existing mass labor initiative expanded
in the region.” See Emily Czachor, “15 Percent of Tibet’s Population Transferred to Chinese Training
Centers as Mass Labor Program Expands,” Newsweek, September 22. 2020, https://www.newsweek.
com/15-percent-tibets-population-transferred-chinese-training-centers-mass-labor-program-expands-1533579.
16
Antonio Graceffo, “China’s Crackdown on Mongolian Culture,” The Diplomat, September 4, 2020,
https://thediplomat.com/2020/09/chinas-crackdown-on-mongolian-culture/.
17
Lily Kuo, “In China, They’re Closing Churches, Jailing Pastors – and even Rewriting Scripture,” Guardian,
January 13, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/13/china-christians-religious-persecutiontranslation-bible;
and Matthew Taylor King, “The Gospel According to Xi,” opinion, Wall Street Journal,
June 4, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-gospel-according-to-xi-11591310956.
18
Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo, “PRC National People’s Congress Proposal on Hong Kong
National Security Legislation,” press statement, May 27, 2020, https://www.state.gov/prc-national-peoplescongress-proposal-on-hong-kong-national-security-legislation/;
“On Beijing’s Imposition of National
Security Legislation on Hong Kong,” June 30, 2020, https://www.state.gov/on-beijings-imposition-ofnational-security-legislation-on-hong-kong/;
and “On the President’s Announcement on Hong Kong,”
press statement, July 15, 2020, https://www.state.gov/on-the-presidents-announcement-on-hong-kong/.
19
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving
the People’s Republic of China: 2019, annual report to Congress, U.S. Department of Defense, May 2019, p.
83, https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/02/2002127082/-1/-1/1/2019_CHINA_MILITARY_POWER_
REPORT.pdf.
20
Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo, “U.S. Position on Maritime Claims in the South China Sea,” press
statement, July 13, 2020, https://www.state.gov/u-s-position-on-maritime-claims-in-the-south-china-sea/; and
“U.S. Imposes Restrictions on Certain PRC State-Owned Enterprises and Executives for Malign Activities
in the South China Sea,” press statement, August 26, 2020, https://www.state.gov/u-s-imposes-restrictions-
on-certain-prc-state-owned-enterprises-and-executives-for-malign-activities-in-the-south-china-sea/.
21
Odd Arne Westad, Restless Empire: China and the World Since 1750 (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2012), pp.
20-44; and Dan Blumenthal, “China’s Imperial Legacy,” in Rise of the Revisionists (Washington, DC: American
Enterprise Institute (AEI), 2018), pp. 45-68, https://www.aei.org/articles/china-the-imperial-legacy/.
22
Washington and Beijing have the two largest national economies, with U.S. gross domestic product
(GDP) at $21 trillion in nominal terms and Chinese GDP at $14 trillion. Their annual trade in goods and
services is massive – $737.1 billion in 2018 — but asymmetrical: the U.S. Trade Representative reports the
United States had a $378.6 billion trade deficit with China in 2018, exporting $179.3 billion in goods and
services while importing $557.9 billion. See Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, “The People’s Republic
of China: Overview,” accessed May 4, 2020, https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/china-mongolia-taiwan/
peoples-republic-china.
23
Beijing uses cyberattacks, theft, and other methods to target key technological and economic sectors
in various U.S. states, and transfer to China valuable data, information, and technology. For examples,
see U.S. Department of Justice, “Harvard University Professor and Two Chinese Nationals Charged in
Three Separate China Related Cases,” press release, January 28, 2020, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/
harvard-university-professor-and-two-chinese-nationals-charged-three-separate-china-related; “Chinese
54
Telecommunications Device Manufacturer and its U.S. Affiliate Indicted for Theft of Trade Secrets, Wire
Fraud, and Obstruction of Justice,” press release, January 28, 2019, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/chinesetelecommunications-device-manufacturer-and-its-us-affiliate-indicted-theft-trade;
“PRC State-Owned
Company, Taiwan Company, and Three Individuals Charged with Economic Espionage,” press release,
November 1, 2018, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/prc-state-owned-company-taiwan-company-and-threeindividuals-charged-economic-espionage;
“Court Imposes Maximum Fine on Sinovel Wind Group for Theft
of Trade Secrets,” press release, July 6, 2018, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/court-imposes-maximum-finesinovel-wind-group-theft-trade-secrets;
and “Chinese National Sentenced to Prison for Conspiracy to Steal
Trade Secrets,” press release, October 5, 2016, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/chinese-national-sentencedprison-conspiracy-steal-trade-secrets.
See also Erik Larson, “Chinese Citizen Indicted in Anthem Hack of 80
Million People,” Bloomberg, May 9, 2019, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-05-09/chinesenational-indicted-by-u-s-grand-jury-over-anthem-hack.
For a superb unclassified study of the history and
current state of China’s intelligence operations, see Peter Mattis and Matthew Brazil, Chinese Communist
Espionage: An Intelligence Primer (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2019).
24
Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, Findings of the Investigation Into China’s Acts, Policies, and Practices
Related to Technology Transfer, Intellectual Property, and Innovation Under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974,
March 2018, https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/Section%20301%20FINAL.PDF; and Update Concerning
China’s Acts, Policies, and Practices Related to Technology Transfer, Intellectual Property, and Innovation,
November 2018, https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/enforcement/301Investigations/301%20Report%20
Update.pdf.
25
Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property, Update on The Theft of American Intellectual
Property Report, National Bureau of Asian Research, February 2017, p. 2, http://www.ipcommission.org/
report/IP_Commission_Report_Update_2017.pdf. Quoted in Office of the U.S. Trade Representative,
Findings of the Investigation Into China’s Acts, Policies, and Practices Related to Technology Transfer, Intellectual
Property, and Innovation Under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, PDF page 203, https://ustr.gov/sites/
default/files/Section%20301%20FINAL.PDF#page=203.
26
FBI Director Christopher Wray, “Responding Effectively to the Chinese Economic Espionage Threat,”
speech to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Washington, D.C., February 6, 2020,
https://www.fbi.gov/news/speeches/responding-effectively-to-the-chinese-economic-espionage-threat.
27
Bob Davis and Jon Hilsenrath, “The Great Unraveling: How China Shock, Deep and Swift,
Spurred the Rise of Trump,” Wall Street Journal, August 11, 2016, https://www.wsj.com/articles/
how-the-china-shock-deep-and-swift-spurred-the-rise-of-trump-1470929543.
28
World Steel Association, “Global Crude Steel Output Increases by 3.4% in 2019,” press release, January 27,
2020, https://www.worldsteel.org/media-centre/press-releases/2020/Global-crude-steel-output-increases-by-
3.4--in-2019.html; International Aluminum Institute, “Primary Aluminum Production,” database, accessed
August 2020, http://www.world-aluminium.org/statistics/#data; Harrison Wolf, “3 Reasons Why China
is the Global Drones Leader,” World Economic Forum, September 19, 2018, https://www.weforum.org/
agenda/2018/09/china-drones-technology-leader/; and ResearchAndMarkets.com, “China’s Shipbuilding
Industry 2018-2022: Increasing Global Investment in Oil & Gas Development,” PR Newswire, July 31,
2018, https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/chinas-shipbuilding-industry-2018-2022-increasingglobal-investment-in-oil--gas-development-300689204.html.
See also Rick Switzer, “U.S. National Security
Implications of Microelectronics Supply Chain Concentrations in Taiwan, South Korea and the People’s
Republic of China (January to July 2019),” unclassified occasional white paper, Office of Commercial and
Economic Analysis, U.S. Air Force, July 2019.
29
SEMI Fab Database Report, SEMI, accessed August 28, 2020, https://www.semi.org/en/products-services/
market-data/fab-forecast.
55
30
“‘Made in China 2025’ to Focus on Ten Key Sectors,” People’s Daily Online, May 22, 2015, http://en.people.
cn/n/2015/0522/c98649-8895998.html. See also Karen M. Sutter, “‘Made in China 2025’ Industrial Policies:
Issues for Congress,” CRS Report No. IF10964, Congressional Research Service, updated August 11, 2020,
https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10964; and Senator Marco Rubio, Made in China 2025
and the Future of American Industry, report of the Chairman’s Project on Strong Labor Markets and National
Development, Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, 116th
Congress, 1st
Session,
February 19, 2019, https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/0acec42a-d4a8-43bd-8608-a34823
71f494/262B39A37119D9DCFE023B907F54BF03.02.12.19-final-sbc-project-mic-2025-report.pdf.
31
Gregory C. Allen, “Understanding China’s AI Strategy: Clues to Chinese Strategic Thinking on Artificial
Intelligence and National Security,” Center for a New American Security (CNAS), February 2019, p. 6,
https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/understanding-chinas-ai-strategy. Allen notes: “China is
currently making extensive use of AI in domestic surveillance applications.”
32
Arjun Kharpal, “Huawei Says It Would Never Hand Data to China’s Government. Experts Say it Wouldn’t
Have a Choice,” CNBC, March 4, 2019, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/05/huawei-would-have-to-give-
data-to-china-government-if-asked-experts.html.
33
FBI Director Christopher Wray, testimony in open hearing on “Worldwide Threats,” U.S. Senate Select
Committee on Intelligence, 115th
Congress, 2nd
Session, February 13, 2018, https://www.intelligence.senate.
gov/hearings/open-hearing-worldwide-threats-0#.
34
Ewelina U. Ochab, “When a Tech Company Engages in Severe Human Rights Violations,” Forbes,
January 6, 2020, https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewelinaochab/2020/01/06/when-a-tech-company-engagesin-severe-human-rights-violations/#788549d16943;
David Alton “Huawei’s Human Rights Record Has
Been Shamefully Ignored,” The Diplomat, February 7, 2020, https://thediplomat.com/2020/02/huaweishuman-rights-record-has-been-shamefully-ignored/;
“U.S. to Slap Huawei Employees with Travel Bans for
China’s Human Rights Abuses,” Associated Press, July 15, 2020, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/
us-to-slap-huawei-employees-with-travel-bans-for-chinas-human-rights-abuses-2020-07-15; Secretary of
State Michael R. Pompeo, “U.S. Imposes Visa Restrictions on Certain Employees of Chinese Technology
Companies that Abuse Human Rights,” press statement, U.S. Department, of State, July 15, 2020, https://
www.state.gov/u-s-imposes-visa-restrictions-on-certain-employees-of-chinese-technology-companies-thatabuse-human-rights/;
and Dr. Samantha Hoffman, “China’s Tech-Enhanced Authoritarianism,” prepared
testimony for hearing on “China’s Digital Authoritarianism: Surveillance, Influence, and Political Control,”
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, 116th
Congress, 1st
Session, May 16, 2019, https://docs.
house.gov/meetings/IG/IG00/20190516/109462/HHRG-116-IG00-Wstate-HoffmanS-20190516.pdf.
35
“China’s Cyber Power in a New Era,” in Tim Huxley and William Choong, eds. Asia-Pacific Regional Security
Assessment 2019, (London, UK: Routledge, International Institute for Strategic Studies, 2019), https://www.
iiss.org/publications/strategic-dossiers/asiapacific-regional-security-assessment-2019/rsa19-07-chapter-5.
36
Nadège Rolland, “A Concise Guide to the Belt and Road Initiative,” National Bureau of Asian Research,
April 11, 2019, https://www.nbr.org/publication/a-guide-to-the-belt-and-road-initiative/; and
Elaine K. Dezenski, “Below the Belt and Road,” Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), May 6,
2020, p. 11, https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2020/05/04/below-the-belt-and-road/. See also Xi Jinping, The
Belt and Road Initiative (Beijing, China: Foreign Languages Press, 2019).
37
The so-called “China Hustle” is an egregious example. As the number of China-based companies listed
in U.S. markets grew after the 2007-2008 financial crisis, U.S. regulators became aware of hundreds of
Chinese companies systematically using irregular investment structures — including reverse mergers with
failed U.S.-listed companies — to list backdoor on U.S. markets while avoiding the due diligence and other
scrutiny that initial public offerings (IPOs) receive. Many U.S.-listed Chinese companies turned out to be
56
fraudulent, exposing U.S. investors and public pension funds to many billions in losses. See NASDAQ, “33
Chinese Companies Listed on NASDAQ in 2009, More Than Any Other U.S. Exchange,” press release,
January 6, 2010, http://ir.nasdaq.com/news-releases/news-release-details/33-chinese-companies-listednasdaq-2009-more-any-other-us
and Nicole Spering, “The China Hustle Unveils the Biggest Financial Scandal
You’ve Never Heard Of,” Vanity Fair, March 28, 2018, https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/03/
china-hustle-documentary-financial-crisis-scandal-director-interview.
38
U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, “Chinese Companies Listed
on Major U.S. Stock Exchanges,” updated February 25, 2019, https://www.uscc.gov/
chinese-companies-listed-major-us-stock-exchanges.
39
Josh Rogin, “Washington Presses Wall Street to Solve its China Problem,” opinion, Washington Post, June 6,
2019,https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/06/06/washington-presses-wall-street-solve-its-chinaproblem/;
Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, “PCAOB Enters into Enforcement Cooperation
Agreement with Chinese Regulators,” press release, May 24, 2013, https://pcaobus.org/News/Releases/
Pages/05202013_ChinaMOU.aspx; and Jay Clayton, Wes Bricker, and William D. Duhnke III, Statement
on the Vital Role of Audit Quality and Regulatory Access to Audit and Other Information Internationally –
Discussion of Current Information Access Challenges with Respect to U.S.-listed Companies With Significant
Operations in China, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, December 7, 2018, https://www.sec.gov/
news/public-statement/statement-vital-role-audit-quality-and-regulatory-access-audit-and-other.
40
Belgium invokes privacy laws. Every other country complies.
41
In a case from 2019, the Commerce Department blacklisted Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology
Co. (Hikvision) — a Chinese state-directed “big brother” surveillance company complicit with China’s
human rights abuses against over one million Uyghurs in Xinjiang — on Commerce’s banned Entity List.
See “Addition of Certain Entities to the Entity List,” 84 FR 54002, Federal Register, October 9, 2019, https://
www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/10/09/2019-22210/addition-of-certain-entities-to-the-entity-list.
Yet many prominent state pension funds — such as the California State Teachers’ Retirement System
(CalSTRS), the New York State Teachers Retirement System (NYSTRS), the Florida Retirement System
(FRS) — held active investments in Hikvision. See Svea Herbst-Bayliss and Tim McLaughlin, “U.S. pension
funds took positions in blacklisted Chinese surveillance company,” Reuters, October 15, 2019, https://
www.reuters.com/article/us-hikvision-pensions-focus/u-s-pension-funds-took-positions-in-blacklistedchinese-surveillance-company-idUSKBN1WU191;
“Hikvision: US pension funds invest in China ‘Big
Brother’ firm,” BBC News, March 29, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47753085; and
RWR Advisory Group, LLC, “Chinese ‘Bad Actor’ Enterprises in State Public Pension Systems,” January
29, 2020. U.S. investors also may be passively investing in Hikvision through exchange traded funds (ETFs)
or mimicking major index providers that include Hikvision and other deeply problematic Chinese firms.
Examples of major index providers, which have included, as constituents, securities for Chinese companies
with links to China’s military modernization, espionage, and human rights abuses, are MSCI China All
Shares Index, MSCI Emerging Markets (EM) Index, MSCI ACWI Index, MSCI ACWI ex-U.S. Index, FTSE
Global Equity Index Series (GEIS). See RWR Advisory Group, LLC, “Chinese ‘Bad Actor’ Enterprises in
State Public Pension Systems.” In another case, Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) and its
subsidiaries are helping China’s military modernization, designing and supplying the Chinese military with
advanced aircraft, unmanned aerial systems, and airborne weapon systems that threaten the U.S. military.
See “Listed Subsidiaries,” website of AVIC, accessed May 11, 2020, https://www.avic.com/en/aboutus/
listedsubsidiaries/index.shtml. Some state pension funds — such as the California Public Employees’
Retirement System (CalPERS) — have actively invested in AVIC subsidiaries, and many more state pension
funds passively invest in AVIC subsidiaries through ETFs or by mimicking major index providers. See
CalPERS, 2018-19 Annual Investment Report for Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 2019, https://www.calpers.
57
ca.gov/docs/forms-publications/annual-investment-report-2019.pdf and RWR Advisory Group, LLC,
“Chinese ‘Bad Actor’ Enterprises in State Public Pension Systems.”
It is worth noting that Yu “Ben” Meng, who until recently served as chief investment officer of CALPERS,
reportedly participated in the Thousand Talents Program. In October 2017, People’s Daily reported that an
earlier employer — the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), a government agency regulates
China’s foreign-exchange activities — hired Yu through TTP in November 2015. See Wu Chuqi, 为国家用
好每一笔外汇（海归人才创新创业风采录）[“Make good use of every foreign exchange for the country (returned
talent innovation and entrepreneurship style record)”], People’s Daily, October 2, 2017, http://society.
people.com.cn/n1/2017/1002/c1008-29571359.html; and Nathan Su, “Chief Investment Officer of Largest
US Public Pension Fund Has Deep Ties to Chinese Regime,” Epoch Times, July 8, 2019, https://www.
theepochtimes.com/chief-investment-officer-of-us-largest-public-pension-fund-has-deep-ties-to-chinese-
regime_2992183.html.
42
Josh Rogin, “White House Calls China’s Threats to Airlines ‘Orwellian Nonsense,’” opinion, Washington
Post, May 5, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/josh-rogin/wp/2018/05/05/white-house-callschinas-threats-to-airlines-orwellian-nonsense/;
Adrian Wojnarowski and Bobby Marks, “Sources: NBA Set
to Release Revised 2020-21 Salary and Luxury Tax Projections,” ESPN, January 30, 2020, https://www.
espn.com/nba/story/_/id/28596920/sources-nba-set-release-revised-2020-21-salary-luxury-tax-projections;
Pei Li and Adam Jourdan, “Mercedes-Benz Apologizes to Chinese for Quoting Dalai Lama,” Reuters,
February 6, 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mercedes-benz-china-gaffe/mercedes-benz-apologizesto-chinese-for-quoting-dalai-lama-idUSKBN1FQ1FJ;
Josh Rogin, “China Takes its Political Censorship
Global: Will America Resist?” opinion, Washington Post, July 26, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.
com/opinions/global-opinions/china-takes-its-political-censorship-global/2018/07/26/898d40dc-90f6-
11e8-bcd5-9d911c784c38_story.html.
43
Kathy Gilsinan, “How China is Planning to Win Back the World,” The Atlantic, May 28, 2020, https://www.
theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/05/china-disinformation-propaganda-united-states-xi-jinping/612085/;
Dan Blumenthal, “China’s Censorship, Propaganda & Disinformation,” AEI, July 10, 2020, https://www.
aei.org/articles/chinas-censorship-propaganda-disinformation/; and Joshua Kurlantzick, “How China
Ramped Up Disinformation Efforts During the Pandemic,” Council on Foreign Relations, September 10,
2020, https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/how-china-ramped-disinformation-efforts-during-pandemic.
44
For recent high-profile examples, see U.S. Department of Justice, “University of Kansas Researcher
Indicted for Fraud for Failing to Disclose Conflict of Interest with Chinese University,” press release,
August 21, 2019, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/university-kansas-researcher-indicted-fraud-failingdisclose-conflict-interest-chinese;
and “Harvard University Professor and Two Chinese Nationals Charged
in Three Separate China Related Cases,” press release, January 28, 2020, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/
harvard-university-professor-and-two-chinese-nationals-charged-three-separate-china-related.
45
Rachelle Peterson, “Outsourced to China: Confucius Institutes and Soft Power in American Higher
Education,”NationalAssociationofScholars,April7,2017,https://www.nas.org/reports/outsourced-to-china/
full-report.
46
The CCP uses Confucius Institutes and other instruments to press U.S. universities to censor free speech
and open inquiry and to conform to the Party’s political correctness. In a press release, the Senate Homeland
Security and Government Affairs Committee’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations noted that its
February 2019 bipartisan staff report examined “the lack of transparency in how American colleges and
universities manage Confucius Institutes — which are located at more than 100 American colleges and
universities and have received more than $150 million in support from the Chinese government.” The
press release added, “These Confucius Institutes are controlled, funded, and mostly staffed by the Chinese
government. The report also details China’s one-sided treatment of U.S. schools and key State Department
58
programs in China and documents the lack of oversight by the Departments of State and Education of
U.S. Confucius Institutes.” For more, see Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee’s
Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, “Senators Portman & Carper Unveil Bipartisan Report on
Confucius Institutes at U.S. Universities & K-12 Classrooms,” press release, February 27, 2019, https://www.
hsgac.senate.gov/subcommittees/investigations/media/senators-portman-and-carper-unveil-bipartisanreport-on-confucius-institutes-at-us-universities_k-12-classrooms;
and China’s Impact on the U.S. Education
System, staff report, 116th
Congress, 1st
Session, February 22, 2019, https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/
media/doc/PSI%20Report%20China’s%20Impact%20on%20the%20US%20Education%20System.pdf.
47
Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo, “U.S. States and the China Competition.” Secretary Pompeo’s
speech noted a Beijing think-tank published a report in June 2019 that assessed all 50 of America’s governors
on their attitudes towards China, and, to refine its influence efforts, labeled each governor as “friendly,”
“hardline,” or “ambiguous.” See 美国对华态度全景 - 州长篇 [Panoramic View of the U.S. Attitudes towards
China – Governors], Minzhi International Research Institute, June 22, 2019, https://user.guancha.cn/main/
content?id=132238. Minzhi’s website is at http://dcthink.cn/.
Secretary Pompeo also mentioned the PRC’s Consul General in New York, who sent a letter in January
2020, to the speaker of a state legislature urging state lawmakers not to exercise their rights to freedom of
speech: “As we all know, Taiwan is part of China… avoid engaging in any official contact with Taiwan,
including sending congratulatory messages to the elected, introducing bills and proclamations for the
election, sending officials and representatives to attend the inauguration ceremony, and inviting officials in
Taiwan to visit the United States.”
Secretary Pompeo cited a third example from August 2019, when a Chinese diplomat in the consul’s office in
Houston sent a letter to then-Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant threatening to cancel a Chinese investment
if he traveled to Taiwan. Nevertheless, the secretary said, Governor Bryant made the trip.
48
The U.S. Department of Defense’s annual report on China’s military power offers an authoritative and
unclassified view of the PLA. For the most recent iteration, see Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military
and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China: 2020.
49
Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, 2012 White Paper, http://
eng.mod.gov.cn/publications/2016-07/13/content_4768293.htm.
50
“Xi Leads China’s Military Reform, Stresses Strong Army,” Xinhua, March 15, 2014, http://www.
chinadaily.com.cn/kindle/2014-03/16/content_17350020.htm. Quoted in Joel Wuthnow and Phillip C.
Saunders, “Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA,” in Phillip C. Saunders, ed., Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA:
Assessing Chinese Military Reforms (Washington, D.C.: National Defense University, 2019), p. 2, https://
ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documents/Books/Chairman-Xi/Chairman-Xi.pdf.
51
John Costello and Joe McReynolds, “China’s Strategic Support Force,” in Phillip C. Saunders, ed.,
Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA: Assessing Chinese Military Reforms, p. 442.
52
Acting DIA Defense Intelligence Officer for East Asia Daniel K. Taylor, prepared testimony for
hearing on “‘World-Class’ Military: Assessing China’s Global Military Ambitions,” U.S.-China
Economic and Security Review Commission, June 20, 2019, https://www.uscc.gov/hearings/
world-class-military-assessing-chinas-global-military-ambitions.
53
Joel Wuthnow and Phillip C. Saunders, “Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA,” pp. 1-3.
54
Robert O. Work and Greg Grant, Beating the Americans at Their Own Game: An Offset Strategy
with Chinese Characteristics, CNAS, June 6, 2019, https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/
beating-the-americans-at-their-own-game.
55
Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis, testimony for hearing “Department of Defense Budget posture in
review of the Defense Authorization Request for Fiscal Year 2018 and the Future Years Defense Program,”
59
Senate Committee on Armed Services, 115th
Congress, 1st
Session, June 13, 2017, https://www.armedservices.senate.gov/hearings/17-06-13-department-of-defense-budget-posture;
and Admiral Harry B.
Harris, Jr., U.S. Navy, testimony for hearing on “United States Pacific Command in Review of the Defense
Authorization Request for Fiscal Year 2019 and the Future Years Defense Program,” Senate Committee
on Armed Services, 115th
Congress, 2nd
Session, March 15, 2018, https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/
hearings/18-03-15-united-states-pacific-command.
56
Robert O. Work and Greg Grant, Beating the Americans at Their Own Game: An Offset Strategy with
Chinese Characteristics, pp. 5-6.
57
These hypersonic weapons will backstop the world’s largest theater-based conventional ballistic missile
force — a class of weapons that until August 2019 the U.S. was prohibited from fielding as one of two
signatories to the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty.
58
Acting DIA Defense Intelligence Officer for East Asia Daniel K. Taylor, prepared testimony for
hearing on “A‘World-Class’ Military: Assessing China’s Global Military Ambitions,” U.S.-China
Economic and Security Review Commission, June 20, 2019, https://www.uscc.gov/hearings/
world-class-military-assessing-chinas-global-military-ambitions.
59
Johnny Wood, “The Countries With the Most Satellites in Space,” World Economic Forum, May 4, 2019,
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/03/chart-of-the-day-the-countries-with-the-most-satellites-in-space/.
60
Defense Intelligence Agency, China Military Power, report, January 3, 2019, p. 41, https://www.
dia.mil/Portals/27/Documents/News/Military%20Power%20Publications/China_Military_Power_
FINAL_5MB_20190103.pdf.
61
Andrea Stricker, “Proliferant States Continue to Rely on China for Nuclear-related Equipment,” FDD, July
2, 2020, https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2020/07/02/proliferant-states-rely-on-china/; and U.S. Department of
State, “Iran, North Korea, and Syria Nonproliferation Act: Imposed Sanctions,” May 29, 2013; https://2009-
2017.state.gov/t/isn/inksna/c28836.htm.
62
U.S. Department of State, “2020 Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation,
and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments (Compliance Report),” June 2020, https://www.state.gov/
wp-content/uploads/2020/06/2020-Adherence-to-and-Compliance-with-Arms-Control-Nonproliferation-
and-Disarmament-Agreements-and-Commitments-Compliance-Report-1.pdf.
63
U.S. Department of State, “2020 Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation,
and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments (Compliance Report).”
64
Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation Christopher A. Ford,
“Ideological “Grievance States” and Nonproliferation: China, Russia, and Iran,” Speech to the Institute
for National Security Studies’ Arms Control Conference and Experts Forum, Tel Aviv, Israel, November
11, 2019, https://www.state.gov/ideological-grievance-states-and-nonproliferation-china-russia-and-iran/.
65
Elsa B. Kania, “Chinese Military Innovation and Artificial Intelligence,” testimony for hearing on “Trade,
Technology, and Military-Civil Fusion,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, June
7, 2019, https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/June%207%20Hearing_Panel%201_Elsa%20Kania_
Chinese%20Military%20Innovation%20in%20Artificial%20Intelligence.pdf; and Assistant Secretary
of State for International Security and Nonproliferation Christopher A. Ford, “Technology and Power
in China’s Geopolitical Ambitions,” testimony for hearing on Trade, Technology, and Military-Civil
Fusion,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, June 20, 2019 https://www.state.gov/
technology-and-power-in-chinas-geopolitical-ambitions/.
66
On the challenges that China’s growing military capabilities pose to the United States, see Elbridge A. Colby,
“The Implications of China Developing a World-Class Military: First and Foremost a Regional Challenge,”
prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘World-Class’ Military: Assessing China’s Global Military Ambitions,”
60
U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, June 20, 2019, https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/
files/Elbridge%20Colby%20Testimony%20to%20the%20US%20China%20Commission%20June%20
20%202019.pdf; “Against the Great Powers: Reflections on Balancing Nuclear and Conventional Power,”
Texas National Security Review, Vol. 2, No. 1 (November 2018), pp. 145-152, https://tnsr.org/2018/11/
against-the-great-powers-reflections-on-balancing-nuclear-and-conventional-power/; and “America Must
Prepare for ‘Limited War’,” CNAS, October 21, 2015, https://www.cnas.org/publications/commentary/
america-must-prepare-for-limited-war.
See also Evan Braden Montgomery, “Contested Primacy in the Western Pacific: China’s Rise and the Future
of U.S. Power Projection,” International Security, Vol. 38, No. 4 (Spring 2014), pp. 115-149, https://www.
mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ISEC_a_00160; Vincent A. Manzo, “After the First Shots: Managing
Escalation in Northeast Asia,” Joint Force Quarterly, No. 77 (April 2015), pp. 91-100, https://ndupress.ndu.
edu/JFQ/Joint-Force-Quarterly-77/Article/581877/after-the-first-shots-managing-escalation-in-northeastasia/;
and Stephen Biddle and Ivan Oelrich, “Future Warfare in the Western Pacific: Chinese Antiaccess/
Area Denial, U.S. AirSea Battle, and Command of the Commons in East Asia,” International Security, Vol.
41, No. 1 (Summer 2016), pp. 7-48, https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/ISEC_a_00249.
67
NeilJ.Morales,“China’sCCCC,Philippines’MacroasiaWin$10billionAirportProject,”Reuters,December
17, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cccc-philippines/chinas-cccc-philippines-macroasia-win-10billion-airport-project-idUSKBN1YL12E;
and “China is Making Substantial Investment in Ports and Pipelines
Worldwide,” The Economist, February 6, 2020, https://www.economist.com/special-report/2020/02/06/
china-is-making-substantial-investment-in-ports-and-pipelines-worldwide.
68
Anne Marie Brady, “Magic Weapons: China’s Political Influence Activities under Xi Jinping,” Wilson
Center, September 18, 2017, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/article/
magic_weapons.pdf; Damien Cave and Jamie Tarabay, “Suddenly Chinese Threat to Australia Seems
Very Real,” The New York Times, November 28, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/28/world/
australia/china-spying-wang-liqiang-nick-zhao.html; and Joshua Kurlantzick, “Australia, New Zealand Face
China’s Influence,” Council on Foreign Relations, December 13, 2017, https://www.cfr.org/expert-brief/
australia-new-zealand-face-chinas-influence.
69
Michael J. Green, China’s Maritime Silk Road: Strategic and Economic Implications for the Indo-Pacific
Region, CSIS, April 2, 2018, https://www.csis.org/analysis/chinas-maritime-silk-road; Richard Ghiasy, Fei
Su and Lora Saalman, The 21st
Century Maritime Silk Road, SIPRI/Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, May 2017,
https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2019-10/the-21st-century-maritime-silk-road.pdf; and Kamran R.
Chowdhury, “China Can Use Bangladesh’s Largest Seaports, PM Hasina Says,” BenarNews, November 13,
2019, https://www.benarnews.org/english/news/bengali/bangladesh-china-11132019171915.html.
70
Jonathan Hillman and Measa McCalpin, “Watching Huawei’s ‘Safe Cities’,” CSIS Brief, November 4,
2019, https://www.csis.org/analysis/watching-huaweis-safe-cities; and Danielle Cave, Samantha Hoffman,
Alex Joske, Fergus Ryan, and Elise Thomas, “Mapping China’s Tech Giants,” Report No. 15, Australia
Strategic Policy Institute, April 18, 2019, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/mapping-chinas-tech-giants.
71
Derek Grossman, et al., China’s Long-Range Bomber Flights: Drivers and Implications, RR2567 (Santa
Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2018), pp. 13-15, https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/
research_reports/RR2500/RR2567/RAND_RR2567.pdf.
72
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving
the People’s Republic of China: 2019, p. 83.
73
“Remote Control: Japan’s Evolving Senkaku’s Strategy,” Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI),
CSIS, July 29, 2020, https://amti.csis.org/remote-control-japans-evolving-senkakus-strategy/.
61
74
“Full Text of Statement of China’s Foreign Ministry on Award of South China Sea Arbitration,” China
Daily, July 12, 2016, https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2016scsi/2016-07/12/content_26062029.htm.
75
“Mischief Reef: Overview Images,” AMTI, CSIS, accessed August 20, 2020, https://amti.csis.org/
mischief-reef/#AnalysisofOutpost-heading.
76
Jeremy Page, Carol E. Lee, and Gordon Lubold, “China’s President Pledges No Militarization in Disputed
Islands,” Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2015, https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-completes-runwayon-artificial-island-in-south-china-sea-1443184818;
and “Chinese Power Projection Capabilities in the South
China Sea,” AMTI, CSIS, accessed May 4, 2020, https://amti.csis.org/chinese-power-projection/.
77
Derek Grossman, “Why is China Pressing Indonesia Over its Maritime Claims,” World Press Review,
January 16, 2020, https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/insights/28476/why-is-china-pressingindonesia-again-over-the-natuna-islands;
Ivy Kwek and Chiew Ping-Hoo, “Malaysia’s Rationale and
Response to South China Sea Tensions,” AMTI, CSIS, May 29 2020, https://amti.csis.org/malaysiasrationale-and-response-to-south-china-sea-tensions/;
and “Chinese Vessel Rams Vietnamese Fishing
Boat in S. China Sea,” Maritime Executive, June 14, 2020, https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/
report-chinese-vessel-rams-vietnamese-fishing-boat-in-s-china-sea.
78
Emma Chanlett-Avery and Mark E. Manyin, “U.S.-North Korea Relations,” CRS Report No. No.
IF10246, Congressional Research Service, April 29, 2020, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/
IF/IF10246/14.
79
PanelofExperts,“ReportofthePanelofExperts[totheU.N.SecurityCouncil]PursuanttoResolution1874
(2009),” S/2020/151, March 2, 2020, https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/sanctions/1718/panel_experts/
reports.
80
For examples, see U.S. Department of State, “Briefing with Special Envoy Lea Gabrielle, Global Engagement
Center Update on PRC Efforts to Push Disinformation and Propaganda around COVID,” press release, May
8, 2020, https://www.state.gov/briefing-with-special-envoy-lea-gabrielle-global-engagement-center-updateon-prc-efforts-to-push-disinformation-and-propaganda-around-covid/;
and “Briefing on Disinformation
and Propaganda Related to COVID-19,” press release, March 27, 2020, https://www.state.gov/briefing-with-
special-envoy-lea-gabrielle-global-engagement-center-on-disinformation-and-propaganda-related-to-covid-19/.
See also Jakub Janda, “Going Viral: Chinese and Russian Disinfo Ops Compared and Contrasted,” Center
for European Policy Analysis, March 19, 2020, https://www.cepa.org/going-viral; and Edward Wong,
Matthew Rosenberg and Julian E. Barnes, “Chinese Agents Helped Spread Messages That Sowed Virus
Panic in U.S., Officials Say,” The New York Times, April 22, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/22/
us/politics/coronavirus-china-disinformation.html.
81
As CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping said in Moscow in June 2019: “Russia is the country I have visited the
most times, and President Putin is my best friend and colleague.” Quoted in Holly Ellyat, “China’s Xi calls
Putin his ‘best friend’ against a backdrop of souring US relations,” CNBC, June 5, 2019, https://www.cnbc.
com/2019/06/05/putin-and-xi-meet-to-strengthen-ties-as-us-relations-sour.html. Russian president Vladimir
Putinsimilarlypraisedthe“unprecedentedlyhighleveloftrustandcooperation”betweenthetwonations:“This
is an alliance relationship in the full sense of a multifaceted strategic partnership.” See Vladimir Putin, “Valdai
Discussion Club session,” Website of the President of Russia, October 3, 2019, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/
president/news/61719. See also Vasily Kashin, “Russia and China Take Military Partnership to New Level,”
Moscow Times, October 23, 2019, https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/10/23/russia-and-china-takemilitary-partnership-to-new-level-a67852;
and Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, “Russia-China Strategic Alliance
Gets a New Boost with Missile Early Warning System,” The Diplomat, October 25, 2019, https://thediplomat.
com/2019/10/russia-china-strategic-alliance-gets-a-new-boost-with-missile-early-warning-system/.
82
The PRC and Russia also are members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a multilateral
62
grouping whose members now also include India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and
Uzbekistan. As one NGO expert notes, SCO’s members “account for 80% of Eurasia’s landmass, 43% of the
world’s population, and a quarter of global GDP. In terms of geographic coverage and population size, it is
the largest regional organization in the world.” Beijing and Moscow have also sought to provide an alternative
to Western-led international order through the BRICS grouping (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South
Africa), though with very limited success. See Angela Stent, “Russia and China: Axis of Revisionists,”
Brookings Institution, February 2020, p. 6, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/
FP_202002_russia_china_stent.pdf.
83
“U.S.Dollar’sShareCollapsesinPaymentsforRussia-ChinaExports,”MoscowTimes,July26,2019,https://www.
themoscowtimes.com/2019/07/26/us-dollars-share-collapses-in-payments-for-russia-china-exports-a66587.
84
“China-Russia Trade Up 3.4% in 2019 Exceeding Record $110Bln — Chinese Customs,” Sputnik,
January 14, 2020, https://sputniknews.com/world/202001141078029670-china-russia-trade-up-34-in-
2019-exceeding-record-110bln--chinese-customs/.
85
Muyu Xu and Chen Aizhu, “China Oil Imports from Top Supplier Saudi Arabia Rise 47% in 2019:
Customs,” Reuters, January 30, 2020, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-trade-oil/
china-oil-imports-from-top-supplier-saudi-arabia-rise-47-in-2019-customs-idUSKBN1ZU0EH.
86
Olga Tanas, Anna Shiryaevskaya, and Dan Murtaugh, “How Russia-China Gas Pipeline
Changes Energy Calculus,” Bloomberg, November 24, 2019, https://www.bloomberg.com/
news/articles/2019-11-25/how-russia-china-gas-pipeline-changes-energy-calculus-quicktake;
and Ariel Cohen, “The Strategic Upside Behind Russia’s $55 Billion ‘Power Of Siberia’ Pipeline
To China,” Fortune, December 9, 2019, https://www.forbes.com/sites/arielcohen/2019/12/06/
is-there-strength-behind-russia-and-chinas-new-power-of-siberia-pipeline/#58f405cb1faf.
87
Swee Lean Collin Koh, “China’s strategic interest in the Arctic goes beyond economics,” opinion,
Defense News, May 12, 2020, https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2020/05/11/chinasstrategic-interest-in-the-arctic-goes-beyond-economics/;
Elizabeth Buchanan, “Russia and China in the
Arctic: Assumptions and Realities,” ASPI’s The Strategist, September 25, 2020, https://www.aspistrategist.
org.au/russia-and-china-in-the-arctic-assumptions-and-realities/; Mary Kay Magistad, “China’s Arctic
Ambitions Have Revived U.S. Interest in the Region,” PRI’s The World, October 12, 2020, https://www.
pri.org/stories/2020-10-12/chinas-arctic-ambitions-have-revived-us-interest-region. See also Atle Staalesen,
“China’s New Icebreaker Completes First Arctic Expedition,” Barents Observer, September 29, 2020, https://
thebarentsobserver.com/en/arctic/2020/09/chinas-new-icebreaker-completes-first-arctic-mission.
88
“Putin Says Action Against Huawei Attempt to Push It Out of Global Market,” Xinhua, June 7, 2019,
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-06/07/c_138125039.htm.
89
For examples, see Samuel Bendett and Elsa Kania, “A New Sino-Russian High-Tech Partnership,”
Australian Strategic Policy Institute, October 29, 2019, https://www.aspi.org.au/report/new-sinorussian-high-tech-partnership;
and Dmitri Simes, “Huawei Plays Star Role in New China-Russia AI
Partnership,” Nikkei Asian Review, February 4, 2020, https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Asia-Insight/
Huawei-plays-star-role-in-new-China-Russia-AI-partnership.
90
Philip Zelikow, et al., “The Rise of Strategic Corruption: How States Weaponize Graft,” Foreign Affairs,
Vol. 99, No. 4 (July/August 2020), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-06-09/
rise-strategic-corruption.
91
Andrea Kendall-Taylor, David Shulman and Dan McCormick, “Navigating Sino-Russian
Defense Cooperation,” War on the Rocks, August 4, 2020, https://warontherocks.com/2020/08/
navigating-sino-russian-defense-cooperation/.
92
Richard Weitz, Parsing Chinese-Russian Military Exercises (Carlisle, PA: Army War College,
63
2015), http://publications.armywarcollege.edu/pubs/2337.pdf. Recently, China participated in
Russia’s Vostok (Eastern) exercise in 2018, which included “3,500 Chinese People’s Liberation Army
(PLA) personnel, 900 pieces of heavy weaponry and 30 fixed-wing aircraft from the PLA’s Northern
Theater Command.” See also Franz-Stefan Gady, “Russia, Chinese Troops Kick Off Russia’s Largest
Military Exercise since 1981,” The Diplomat, September 12, 2018, https://thediplomat.com/2018/09/
russian-chinese-troops-kick-off-russias-largest-military-exercise-since-1981/.
93
Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, “Press Statements Following Russian-Chinese Talks,” Kremlin, Jun 5,
2019, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/60672.
94
Andrew Osborn and Joyce Lee, “First Russian-Chinese Air Patrol in Asia-Pacific Draws Shots from
South Korea,” Reuters, July 22, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-southkorea-russia-aircraft/
first-russian-chinese-air-patrol-in-asia-pacific-draws-shots-from-south-korea-idUSKCN1UI072; and Mike
Yeo, “Russian-Chinese Air Patrol was an Attempt to Divide Allies, Says Top US Air Force Official in
Pacific,” Defense News, August 23, 2019, https://www.defensenews.com/global/asia-pacific/2019/08/23/
russian-chinese-air-patrol-was-an-attempt-to-divide-allies-says-top-us-air-force-official-in-pacific/.
95
Vladimir Isachenkov, “Putin: Russia-China Military Alliance Can’t Be Ruled Out,” Associated Press,
October 22, 2020, https://apnews.com/article/beijing-moscow-foreign-policy-russia-vladimir-putin-1d4b1
12d2fe8cb66192c5225f4d614c4; and Jun Mai, “Beijing Gives Cautious Welcome to Vladimir Putin’s Hint
over Russia-China Military Alliance,” South China Morning Post, October 25, 2020, https://www.scmp.
com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3107027/beijing-gives-cautious-welcome-vladimir-putins-hint-over.
96
U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, 2019 Report to Congress, November 2019, p.
331, https://www.uscc.gov/files/001166.
97
YaroslavTrofimov,“TheNewBeijing-MoscowAxis,”opinion, WallStreetJournal,February1,2019, https://
www.wsj.com/articles/the-new-beijing-moscow-axis-11549036661?mod=hp_lead_pos8&mod=article_
inline. On COVID-19’s impact on Russia’s economy, see Anders Åslund, “The Russian Economy in Health,
Oil, and Economic Crisis,” Atlantic Council, May 27, 2020, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/commentary/
long-take/the-russian-economy-in-health-oil-and-economic-crisis/.
98
Defense Intelligence Agency, Russia Military Power: Building a Military to Support Great Power Aspirations,
report, June 2017, p. 16, https://www.dia.mil/Portals/27/Documents/News/Military%20Power%20
Publications/Russia%20Military%20Power%20Report%202017.pdf.
99
Nadège Rolland, “A Concise Guide to the Belt and Road Initiative.”
100
Zhao Lei, “3 Sea Routes Planned for Belt & Road Initiative,” China Daily, June 21, 2017, http://english.
www.gov.cn/state_council/ministries/2017/06/21/content_281475692760102.htm.
101
Liu Yazhou, “The Grand National Strategy,” Chinese Law & Government, Vol. 40, No. 2 (December 2014),
pp. 13-36, https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2753/CLG0009-4609400201?journalCode=mclg20.
102
Philippe Le Corre, prepared testimony for hearing on “Chinese Investment and Influence in Europe,”
House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia and Emerging Threats, 115th
Congress,
2nd
Session, May 23, 2018, p. 2, http://docs.house.gov/meetings/FA/FA14/20180523/108355/HHRG-115FA14-Wstate-LeCorreP-20180523.pdf.
Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS) and the Rhodium
Group (RHG) released a 2019 update report on Chinese FDI in European Union (EU) stating that the
trend declined in the last three years largely due to domestic variables, shrinking Chinese global FDI, and
growing regulatory scrutiny in host economies. See Agatha Kratz, Mikko Huotari, Thilo Haneman, and
Rebecca Arcesati, “Chinese FDI in Europe: 2019 Update,” Rhodium Group, April 8, 2020, https://rhg.
com/research/chinese-fdi-in-europe-2019-update/; and Thilo Hanemann, Mikko Huotari, and Agatha
Kratz, “Chinese FDI in Europe: 2018 Trends and Impacts of New Screening Policies,” MERICS, June 3,
2019, https://www.merics.org/en/papers-on-china/chinese-fdi-in-europe-2018.
64
103
Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation Christopher A. Ford,
“Competitive Strategy vis-à-vis China: The Case Study of Civil Nuclear Cooperation,” remarks to the Project
2049 Institute, Arlington, VA, June 24, 2019, https://www.state.gov/competitive-strategy-vis-a-vis-china-thecase-study-of-civil-nuclear-cooperation/;
Sam Reynolds, “Why the Civil Nuclear Trap is Part and Parcel of the
Belt and Road Strategy” The Diplomat, July 5, 2018, https://thediplomat.com/2018/07/why-the-civil-nucleartrap-is-part-and-parcel-of-the-belt-and-road-strategy/;
and “China Could Build 30 ‘Belt and Road’ Nuclear
Reactors by 2030: Official,” Reuters, June 20, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-nuclearpower/
china-could-build-30-belt-and-road-nuclear-reactors-by-2030-official-idUSKCN1TL0HZ.
104
“UK Made ‘a Very Bad Decision’ on Huawei, Chinese Envoy Says,” editorial, Xinhua, July 20, 2020,
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2020-07/20/c_139226918.htm; “UK and China Relationship
‘Seriously Poisoned,’ Says Beijing’s Ambassador,” BBC News, July 30, 2020, https://www.bbc.com/
news/uk-politics-53595423; Laura Hughes and Helen Warrell, “China Envoy Warns of ‘Consequences’
If Britain Rejects Huawei,” Financial Times, July 6, 2020, https://www.ft.com/content/3d67d1c1-98ff-
439a-90a1-099c18621ee9; and Ben Quinn, “China Warns UK Relations are at a ‘Historical Juncture’ over
Hinkley Point,” The Guardian, August 8, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/08/
china-warns-uk-relations-historical-juncture-hinkley-point-liu-xiaoming.
105
Michael Doran and Peter Rough, “China’s Emerging Middle Eastern Kingdom,” Tablet Magazine, August
2, 2020, https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/china-middle-eastern-kingdom.
106
Michal Meidan, China’s Energy Security at 70 (Oxford, UK: University of Oxford, October 2019), p. 2,
https://www.oxfordenergy.org/wpcms/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Chinas-energy-security-at-70.pdf.
107
“The Growing Appetite for Armed Drones in the Middle East,” The Economist, March 9, 2019, https://
www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2019/03/09/the-growing-appetite-for-armed-drones-inthe-middle-east;
and Zeina Karam, “Report: China is Driving Use of Armed Drones in the Middle East,”
Associated Press, December 17, 2018, https://apnews.com/56cfdc2ab6224891a264fc88f70200c8.
108
Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) have increased purchases of Israeli subsidiaries in sensitive sectors
and invested in Israeli infrastructure projects that overlap with Israel’s defense and technology sector. This
has raised serious concerns about protecting the information of shared U.S.-Israel defense and intelligence
activities. Chinese SOEs, some of which are known to have completed work for the People’s Liberation
Army, have undertaken the building and operating of four major infrastructure projects in Israel, estimated
to be worth more than $4 billion. See Shira Efron, Karen Schwindt, and Emily Haskel, Chinese Investment
in Israeli Technology and Infrastructure, RR3176 (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2020), pp. 18
and 38-39, https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR3176.html.
109
Shira Efron, Karen Schwindt, and Emily Haskel, Chinese Investment in Israeli Technology and Infrastructure,
p. 70. See also Ivan Levingston, “U.S. Raises China Concerns Over Israel’s Sale of Largest Seaport,” Bloomberg,
October 6, 2020, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-06/u-s-raises-china-concerns-over-
israel-s-sale-of-largest-seaport.
110
Eleanor Albert, “China in Africa: Backgrounder,” Council on Foreign Relations, last updated July 12,
2017, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/china-africa. See also Joseph Goldstein, “Kenyans Say Chinese
Investment Brings Racism and Discrimination,” The New York Times, October 15, 2018, https://www.
nytimes.com/2018/10/15/world/africa/kenya-china-racism.html.
111
Lina Benabdallah, “Spite Won’t Beat China in Africa,” Foreign Policy, January 23, 2019, https://
foreignpolicy.com/2019/01/23/spite-wont-beat-china-in-africa/. Beijing’s influence operations in Africa
have also reshaped voting patterns at the United Nations and other multilateral institutions in ways intended
to reorient the international order around China’s goals. See Axel Dreher, et al., “Apples and Dragon Fruits:
65
The Determinants of Aid and Other Forms of State Financing from China to Africa,” International Studies
Quarterly, Vol. 62, No. 1 (March 2018), pp. 182-194, https://academic.oup.com/isq/article/62/1/182/4841635.
112
Jenni Marsh, “China Says It Has a ‘Zero-Tolerance Policy’ for Racism, but Discrimination towards
Africans Goes Back Decades,” CNN, May 25, 2020, https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/25/asia/chinaanti-african-attacks-history-hnk-intl/index.html;
and “Racist Incidents against Africans in China amid
Coronavirus Crackdown Spark Outcry,” CBS News, May 23, 2020, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/
coronavirus-racism-africans-china/.
113
This averages roughly 6.2 billion barrels per day of crude oil, condensate, and refined petroleum. See
Justine Barden, “The Bab el-Mandeb is a Strategic Route for Oil and Natural Gas Shipments,” U.S. Energy
Information Administration, August 27, 2019, https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=41073/.
114
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving
the People’s Republic of China: 2019, p. 16, https://media.defense.gov/2019/May/02/2002127082/-1/-
1/1/2019_CHINA_MILITARY_POWER_REPORT.pdf.
115
Huawei had sought to build a transoceanic cable connecting South America to Asia but lost out to
Japan’s NEC. See Natalia A. Ramos Miranda, “Huawei Wants to Build First Fiber-Optic Cable Between
South America and Asia,” Reuters, August 28, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-huawei-tech-
chile/huawei-wants-to-build-first-fiber-optic-cable-between-south-america-and-asia-idUSKCN1VI2N2;
and Sarah Zheng, “China’s Huawei Loses Out to Japan’s NEC on Chile-Asia Trans-Pacific Cable Project,”
South China Morning Post, July 30, 2020, https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3095367/
chinas-huawei-loses-out-japans-nec-chile-asia-trans-pacific.
116
Dan Yurman, “Argentina Reports $10 Billion Nuclear Deal with China,” Energy Central, May 25, 2019,
https://energycentral.com/c/ec/argentina-reports-10b-nuclear-deal-china; “China Signs $15 Billion Nuclear
Deal with Argentina,” Agence France-Presse, November 17, 2015; and “Brazil Looks to China to Finish
Nuclear Power Plant,” Reuters, August 29, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/brazil-nuclear-china/
brazil-looks-to-china-to-finish-nuclear-power-plant-idUSL2N1LF0WN.
117
MattFerchen,“China,Venezuela,andtheIllusionofDebt-TrapDiplomacy,”AsiaGlobalOnline,August16,2018,
https://carnegietsinghua.org/2018/08/16/china-venezuela-and-illusion-of-debt-trap-diplomacy-pub-77089.
118
Matt Ferchen, “China, Venezuela, and the Illusion of Debt-Trap Diplomacy.”
119
Ernesto Londoño, “From a Space Station in Argentina, China Expands Its Reach in Latin America,”
The New York Times, July 28, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/28/world/americas/china-latin-
america.html.
120
Larry Diamond and Orville Schell, eds., China’s Influence & American Interests: Promoting Constructive
Vigilance.
121
Svea Herbst-Bayliss and Tim McLaughlin, “U.S. Pension Funds Took Positions in Blacklisted Chinese
Surveillance Company,” Reuters, October 15, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hikvision-pensions-
focus/u-s-pension-funds-took-positions-in-blacklisted-chinese-surveillance-company-idUSKBN1WU191;
“Hikvision: US Pension Funds Invest in China ‘Big Brother’ Firm,” BBC News, March 29, 2019, https://
www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47753085 and RWR Advisory Group, LLC, “Chinese ‘Bad Actor’
Enterprises in State Public Pension Systems.”
122
Edward Wong, Lara Jakes, and Steven Lee Myers, “U.S. Orders China to Close Houston Consulate, Citing
Efforts to Steal Trade Secrets,” The New York Times, July 22, 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/
world/asia/us-china-houston-consulate.html.
123
For recent examples, see U.S. Department of Justice, “University of Kansas Researcher Indicted for Fraud
for Failing to Disclose Conflict of Interest with Chinese University”; and “Harvard University Professor
66
and Two Chinese Nationals Charged in Three Separate China Related Cases.”
124
China extends its “long arm” of authoritarianism to punish Chinese students studying in the United
States who express dissent or otherwise exercise free speech. For example, in July 2019, Chinese police in
Wuhan reportedly arrested Luo Daiqing, a University of Minnesota student on summer break who, according
to a Chinese court document, “used his Twitter account to post more than 40 comments denigrating a
national leader’s image and indecent pictures.” Luo was reportedly sentenced to six months in prison. See
Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “University of Minnesota Student Jailed in China Over Tweets,” Axios, January
23, 2020, https://www.axios.com/china-arrests-university-minnesota-twitter-e495cf47-d895-4014-9ac8-
8dc76aa6004d.html.
125
Tamar Lewin, “Taking More Seats on Campus, Foreigners Also Pay the Freight,” The New York
Times, February 4, 2012, https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/education/international-students-paytop-dollar-at-us-colleges.html;
Paul Musgrave, “Universities Aren’t Ready for Trade War Casualties,”
Foreign Policy, May 19, 2018, https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/05/19/universities-arent-ready-for-tradewar-casualties-china-trump-us/;
and Elizabeth Redden, “Will Coronavirus Trigger an Enrollment
Crisis?” Inside Higher Ed, February 13, 2020, https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/02/13/
longer-coronavirus-crisis-persists-bigger-likely-impact-chinese-student-enrollments.
126
M. Martel, J. Baer, N. Andrejko and L. Mason, Open Doors 2019 Report on International Educational
Exchange (New York, NY.: Institute of International Education, 2019), pp. 8; 39-40; 62.
127
Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee’s Permanent Subcommittee on
Investigations, China’s Impact on the U.S. Education System.
128
Axel Dreher, et al., “Apples and Dragon Fruits: The Determinants of Aid and Other Forms of State
Financing from China to Africa,” pp. 182-194.
129
Courtney J. Fung and Shing-Hon Lam, “China Already Leads 4 of the 15 UN Specialized Agencies – and is
AimingforaFifth,”WashingtonPost,March3,2020,https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/03/
china-already-leads-4-15-un-specialized-agencies-is-aiming-5th/.
130
U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, “The PRC in International Organizations,”
updated April 20, 2020, https://www.uscc.gov/prc-international-orgs.
131
Kristine Lee and Alexander Sullivan, People’s Republic of the United Nations: China’s Emerging
Revisionism in International Organizations, CNAS, May 2019, https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/
peoples-republic-of-the-united-nations.
132
Peter Berkowitz, “China, Foreign Affairs, and the Anti-Ideology Delusion,” RealClearPolitics, October
4, 2020, https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/10/04/china_foreign_affairs_and_the_anti-
ideology_delusion_144345.html.
133
John Garnaut, “Engineers of the Soul: Ideology in Xi Jinping’s China,” speech to an internal Australian
government seminar, August 2017, in Bill Bishop, ed., Sinocism, January 6, 2019, https://sinocism.com/p/
engineers-of-the-soul-ideology-in.
134
Odd Arne Westad, Restless Empire: China and the World Since 1750.
135
Mao Zedong, “Opening Speech at the First Session of the First NPC (September 15, 1954),” in Michael
Y.M. Kau and John K. Leung, eds. The Writings of Mao Zedong, 1949-1976, Vol. 1 (White Plains, NY: East
Gate Books, 1986), p. 475.
136
Daniel J. Tobin, “How Xi Jinping’s ‘New Era’ Should Have Ended U.S. Debate on Beijing’s Ambitions.”
137
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects
and Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” report delivered
to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, October 18, 2017, p. 16, http://www.
67
xinhuanet.com/english/download/Xi_Jinping’s_report_at_19th_CPC_National_Congress.pdf. Chinese
text is available at http://www.xinhuanet.com//politics/19cpcnc/2017-10/27/c_1121867529.htm or http://
www.gov.cn/zhuanti/2017-10/27/content_5234876.htm. See also Daniel J. Tobin, “How Xi Jinping’s ‘New
Era’ Should Have Ended U.S. Debate on Beijing’s Ambitions”; and Chris Buckley, “China Enshrines ‘Xi
Jinping Thought,’ Elevating Leader to Mao-Like Status,” The New York Times, October 24, 2017, https://
www.nytimes.com/2017/10/24/world/asia/china-xi-jinping-communist-party.html.
138
Paul Mozur and Aaron Krolik, “A Surveillance Net Blankets China’s Cities, Giving Police Vast
Powers,” The New York Times, December 17, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/technology/
china-surveillance.html; and Kenneth Roth and Maya Wang, “Data Leviathan: China’s Burgeoning
Surveillance State,” Human Rights Watch, August 16, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/08/16/
data-leviathan-chinas-burgeoning-surveillance-state.
139
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and
Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” p. 57.
140
Deng Xiaoping, “Four Cardinal Principles,” speech before the Forum on the Principles for the [Chinese
Communist] Party’s Theoretical Work, March 30, 1979, https://cpcchina.chinadaily.com.cn/2010-10/15/
content_13918193.htm.
141
Minxin Pei, “A Tale of Three Speeches: How Xi Jinping’s 40th
Anniversary Speech Marks
a Departure,” Center for International Maritime Security, June 11, 2019, http://cimsec.
org/a-tale-of-three-speeches-how-xi-jinpings-40th-anniversary-speech-marks-a-departure/40566.
142
Karl Marx, “On The Jewish Question,” in Robert C. Tucker, ed., The Marx-Engels Reader, 2nd ed.
(New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 1978), pp. 26-52; and Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, “Manifesto of the
Communist Party,” in Tucker, ed., The Marx-Engels Reader, pp. 469-500. For a critique of the Marxist view,
see, Peter Berkowitz, “Capitalism, Socialism, and Freedom,” The Hoover Institution, February 24, 2020,
https://www.hoover.org/research/capitalism-socialism-freedom.
143
Chris Buckley, “China Takes Aim at Western Ideas,” The New York Times, Aug. 19, 2013, https://www.
nytimes.com/2013/08/20/world/asia/chinas-new-leadership-takes-hard-line-in-secret-memo.html.
144
Daniel J. Tobin, “How Xi Jinping’s ‘New Era’ Should Have Ended U.S. Debate on Beijing’s Ambitions.”
145
Xie Lei and Zhao Jing, eds., 陈曙光：改革开放的世界贡献 [Chen Shuguang: The World Contribution of
Reform and Opening Up], People’s Daily, October 7, 2018, http://theory.people.com.cn/n1/2018/1007/
c40531-30326593.html.
146
John W. Garver, China’s Quest (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2016), pp. 11 and 14.
147
John Irgengioro, “China’s National Identity and the Root Causes of China’s Ethnic Tensions,” East Asia:
An International Quarterly, Vol. 35, No. 4 (December 2018), pp. 317-330.
148
Lucian Pye, China: An Introduction (New York, NY: Harpers Collins Publishers, 1991), pp. 106 -122;
John Keay, China: A History (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2009); James Kurth, The American Way of
Empire: How America Won a World But Lost Her Way, pp. 240-255; and “Legalism in Chinese Philosophy,”
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, December 10, 2014, revised Nov. 16, 2018, https://plato.stanford.edu/
entries/chinese-legalism/.
149
See Peter Berkowitz, “The United States, National Traditions, and Human Rights,” Telos, Fall 2020,
http://www.peterberkowitz.com/articles/2020/20200900-United_States_National_Traditions_and_
Human_Rights-Telos.pdf.
150
Miles Yu, “Understanding China’s Strategic Culture Through its South China
Sea Gambit,” Hoover Institution, May 9, 2016, https://www.hoover.org/research/
understanding-chinas-strategic-culture-through-its-south-china-sea-gambit.
68
151
John Pomfret, “U.S. Takes a Tougher Tone With China,” Washington Post, July 30, 2010, https://www.
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/29/AR2010072906416.html.
152
“Foreign Minister Wang Yi Answers Questions from Chinese and Foreign Journalists,” Xinhua News,
March 8, 2014, http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2014lh/foreign-minister/.
153
Miles Yu, “Understanding China’s Strategic Culture Through its South China Sea Gambit,” https://
www.hoover.org/research/understanding-chinas-strategic-culture-through-its-south-china-sea-gambit.
154
ChaoDengandLizaLin,“InXiJinping’sChina,NationalismTakesaDarkTurn,”TheWallStreetJournal,October
22, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-xi-jinpings-china-nationalism-takes-a-dark-turn-11603382993.
155
Xi Jinping, “China’s Diplomacy Must Befit Its Major-Country Status,” in Xi, The Governance of China
II (Beijing, China: Foreign Languages Press, 2017) pp. 479-483. See also Wang Yi, “Exploring the Path
of Major Country Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics,” speech at the Second World Peace Forum,
Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, June 27, 2013, http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/zxxx/t1053908.shtml;
and “Bringing the East and West Together in Shared Commitment to Multilateralism,” speech at the 56th
Munich Security Conference, Munich, Germany February 15, 2020, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/
wjb_663304/wjbz_663308/2461_663310/t1745384.shtml.
156
During this period, the Qing Dynasty in China suffered a series of territorial losses and other concessions
at the hands of Western imperial powers, beginning with Britain’s defeat of the Qing Dynasty in the First
Opium War (1839-1842). See Alison Kaufman, prepared testimony for hearing on “China’s Narratives
Regarding National Security Policy,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, March 10,
2011, https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/3.10.11Kaufman.pdf.
157
For a critique of the tendency to rely on the CCP’s interpretation of Chinese history, see James A. Millward,
“We Need a New Approach to Teaching Modern Chinese History: We Have Lazily Repeated False Narratives
for Too Long,” Medium, October 8, 2020, https://jimmillward.medium.com/we-need-a-new-approachto-teaching-modern-chinese-history-we-have-lazily-repeated-false-d24983bd7ef2.
See also Charles Horner
and Eric Brown, “A Century After the Qing: Yesterday’s Empire and Today’s Republics,” China Heritage
Quarterly, No. 27 (September 2011), http://www.chinaheritagequarterly.org/features.php?searchterm=027_
century.inc&issue=027; and “The Invisible Battle for Sinophone Asia,” Hudson Institute, December 17,
2014, https://www.hudson.org/research/10873-the-invisible-battle-for-sinophone-asia.
158
Constitution of the Communist Party of China, Revised and Adopted at the 19th National Congress of the
Communist Party of China on October 24, 2017, English translation, p. 4, http://news.xinhuanet.com/
english/download/Constitution_of_the_Communist_Party_of_China.pdf. Chinese text is available at
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/19cpcnc/2017-10/28/c_1121870794.htm.; and Xi Jinping, “Secure
a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and Strive for the Great
Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” p. 51.
159
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and
Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” pp. 11-12.
160
Xi Jinping, “Achieving Rejuvenation is the Dream of the Chinese People” in Xi, The Governance of China
I, p. 38.
161
Xi Jinping, “Speech on the 100th
Anniversary of the May 4th
Movement,” speech, Beijing, China, April
30, 2019, http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/leaders/2019-04/30/c_1124436427.htm.
162
Daniel J. Tobin, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion of Alternative
Global Norms and Standards,” pp. 2-3.
163
Constitution of the Communist Party of China, Revised and Adopted at the 19th National Congress of the
Communist Party of China on October 24, 2017, p. 4. See also Timothy R. Heath, China’s New Governing Party
Paradigm: Political Renewal and the Pursuit of National Rejuvenation (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing,
69
2014), p. 60; and Daniel J. Tobin, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion
of Alternative Global Norms and Standards,” pp. 27-28.
164
Daniel J. Tobin, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion of Alternative
Global Norms and Standards,” p. 19.
165
Constitution of the Communist Party of China, Revised and Adopted at the 19th National Congress of the
Communist Party of China on October 24, 2017, p. 7.
166
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and
Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” p. 21.
167
Xi Jinping, “Uphold and Develop Socialism with Chinese Characteristics.”
168
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and
Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” p. 25.
169
Xi Jinping, “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and
Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era,” pp. 6, 17, 21-22, 52,
and 54. The Party’s official English translation renders the phrase as “community with shared future for
mankind.” U.S. analysts prefer “community of common destiny for mankind,” (emphasis added) because it
more faithfully reflects the CCP’s China-centrism. On “community of common destiny for mankind,” see
Liza Tobin, “Xi’s Vision for Transforming Global Governance: A Strategic Challenge for Washington and
its Allies,” Texas National Security Review, Vol. 2, No. 1 (November 2018), p. 155, https://tnsr.org/2018/11/
xis-vision-for-transforming-global-governance-a-strategic-challenge-for-washington-and-its-allies/; and
Daniel J. Tobin, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion of Alternative
Global Norms and Standards,” p. 9. See also Xi Jinping, On Building a Human Community with a Shared
Future (Beijing, China: Central Compilation and Translation Press, 2019).
170
Liza Tobin, “Xi’s Vision for Transforming Global Governance: A Strategic Challenge for Washington
and its Allies,” p. 155.
171
Nadège Rolland, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion of Alternative
Global Norms and Standards,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, March 13, 2020, pp.
4-6,https://www.uscc.gov/hearings/china-model-beijings-promotion-alternative-global-norms-and-standards.
172
Xi Jinping, “Improve Our Ability to Participate in Global Governance,” main points of the speech at
the 35th group study session of the Political Bureau of the 18th CPC Central Committee, September 27,
2016, in Xi, The Governance of China II, pp. 489-490.
173
“Xi Urges Breaking New Ground in Major Country Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics,” Xinhua
News, June 24, 2018, http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-06/24/c_137276269.htm; and Daniel J.
Tobin, prepared testimony for hearing on “A ‘China Model?’ Beijing’s Promotion of Alternative Global
Norms and Standards.”
174
Matthew Kroenig, The Return of Great Power Rivalry: Democracy vs. Autocracy from the Ancient World
to the U.S. and China (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2020), pp. 11-49.
175
KatsujiNakazawa,“China’sStreet-StallDebatePutsXiandLiatOdds,”Nikkei AsianReview,June11,2020,
https://asia.nikkei.com/Editor-s-Picks/China-up-close/China-s-street-stall-debate-puts-Xi-and-Li-at-odds.
176
Christopher Gobel and Lynette H. Ong, “Social Unrest in China,” Europe China Research and Advice
Network, October 1, 2012, https://www.chathamhouse.org/publications/papers/view/186507; Huileng
Tan, “China’s Says Its Economy Grew 6.1% in 2019, in Line with Expectations,” CNBC, January 16, 2020,
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/17/china-gdp-for-full-year-and-q4-2019.html;and “GDP growth (annual
%) — China,” World Bank, accessed August 28, 2020, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.
MKTP.KD.ZG?locations=CN.
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177
Sidney Leng, “Coronavirus: China Faces Historic Test as Pandemic Stokes Fear of Looming Unemployment
Crisis,” South China Morning Post, May 11, 2020, https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/
article/3083513/coronavirus-china-faces-historic-test-pandemic-stokes-fears. See also “China Plans Tighter
Control to Counter Social Unrest Over Virus,” Bloomberg News, April 22, 2020, https://www.bloomberg.
com/news/articles/2020-04-22/china-plans-tighter-control-to-counter-social-unrest-over-virus.
178
Kaj Malden and Suzanna Stephens, “Cascading Economic Impacts of the COVID-19 Outbreak in
China,” U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, April 21, 2020, https://uscc.gov/research/
cascading-economic-impacts-covid-19-outbreak-china.
179
China imports more than 95 percent of high-end chips used in computers and servers “despite spending
billions to catch up.” See Yuan Yang and Lucy Hornby, “China Raises Alarm Over Its Dependency on
Imported Chips,” Financial Times, July 18, 2018, https://www.ft.com/content/410306d8-8ae0-11e8-bf9e-
8771d5404543; and “China to Import $300 Billion of Chips for Third Straight Year: Industry Group,”
Reuters, August 26, 2020,
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-semiconductors/china-to-import-300-billion-of-chips-for-third-
straight-year-industry-group-idUSKBN25M1CX.
180
Paula J. Dobriansky, “An Allied Plan to Depend Less on China,” opinion, Wall Street Journal, April 30,
2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/an-allied-plan-to-depend-less-on-china-11588288513.
181
Michael R. Auslin, The End of the Asian Century: War, Stagnation, and the Risks to the World’s Most
Dynamic Region (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2017), pp. 24-25.
182
Anjani Trivedi, “A Wave of Bad Loans Could Swallow China’s Banks,” Bloomberg, April 28, 2020, https://
www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-29/a-wave-of-bad-loans-could-swallow-china-s-banks
183
Andrew Frew McMillan, “U.S.-Listed Chinese Stocks Open Secondary Escape Hatch in
Hong Kong,” Real Money’s The Street, June 5, 2020, https://realmoney.thestreet.com/investing/
stocks/u-s-listed-chinese-stocks-open-secondary-escape-hatch-in-hong-kong-15341110.
184
Derek Scissors, “A Stagnant China in 2040, Briefly,”AEI, March 16, 2020, https://www.aei.org/researchproducts/report/a-stagnant-china-in-2040-briefly/;
Christopher Balding, “What’s Causing China’s Economic
Slowdown?” Foreign Affairs, March 11, 2019, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2019-03-11/
whats-causing-chinas-economic-slowdown; and Alexandra Stevenson, “China’s Spenders Are Saving: That’s
a Problem for Everyone,” The New York Times, October 2, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/02/
business/china-consumers.html.
185
For more on social unrest research, see Christian Gobel, “Social Unrest: A Bird’s Eye View,” in Teresa
Wright, ed., Handbook of Protest and Resistance in China (Cheltenham, U.K.: Edward Elgar Publishing,
2019), pp. 27-45; Christopher Gobel and Lynette H. Ong, “Social Unrest in China”; and “Why Protests Are
So Common in China,” The Economist, October 4, 2018, https://www.economist.com/china/2018/10/04/
why-protests-are-so-common-in-china.
186
James Mann, The China Fantasy, pp. 49-54.
187
Nicholas Eberstadt, “China’s Demographic Outlook to 2040 and its Implications:
An Overview,” AEI, January 22, 2019, https://www.aei.org/research-products/report/
chinas-demographic-outlook-to-2040-and-its-implications-an-overview/.
188
Eleanor Albert and Beina Xu, “China’s Environmental Crisis,” Council on Foreign Relations, January
18, 2016, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/chinas-environmental-crisis.
189
Jing Huang, Xiaochuan Pan, Xinbiao Guo, and Guoxing Li, “Health Impact of China’s Air Pollution
Prevention and Control Action Plan: an Analysis of National Air Quality Monitoring and Mortality Data,”
Lancet Planetary Health, Vol. 2, No. 7 (Jun 30, 2018), pp. e313-e323, https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/
journals/lanplh/PIIS2542-5196(18)30141-4.pdf.
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190
Tyler Headley and Cole Tanigawa-Lau, “Measuring Chinese Discontent,” Foreign Affairs, March 10,
2016, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2016-03-10/measuring-chinese-discontent. They
write, “Even though protests in Hong Kong are larger in scale, protests happen more frequently in mainland
China. According to a broad scholarly consensus, there are more than 130,000 protests per year, or nearly
400 daily, with fewer than 250 (less than one percent) involving more than 100 people.”
191
See endnotes 14-17.
192
Adrian Zenz, “China’s Domestic Security Spending: An Analysis of Available Data,” Jamestown
Foundation’s China Brief, Vol. 18, No. 4 (March 2018), p. 6, https://jamestown.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/03/CB_18_4-2.pdf?x47979. Zenz estimates China spent 1,046,000 million RMB on external
defense in 2017. Given how he calculates 1,200,400 million in RMB in national domestic security spending
in 2017 as equal to $197 billion or $349 billion on a PPP basis, we proportionally calculated 1,046,000 RMB
on external defense spending in 2017 as roughly equal to $171 billion in nominal dollars or $304 billion on
a PPP basis.
193
Adrian Zenz, “China’s Domestic Security Spending: An Analysis of Available Data,” p. 6. Given how Zenz
calculates 1,200,400 million in RMB in national domestic security spending in 2017 to equal $197 billion
in nominal dollars, we proportionally calculate 348,616 million RMB on external defense spending in 2007
to equal $57.2 billion in nominal dollars. For news reporting related to Zenz’s analysis, see Josh Chin, “China
SpendsMoreonDomesticSecurityasXi’sPowersGrow,”WallStreetJournal,March6,2018,https://www.wsj.
com/articles/china-spends-more-on-domestic-security-as-xis-powers-grow-1520358522;andC.K.Tan,“China
spending puts domestic security ahead of defense,” Asian Nikkei Review, March 14, 2018, https://asia.nikkei.
com/Spotlight/China-People-s-Congress-2018/China-spending-puts-domestic-security-ahead-of-defense.
194
Phillip C. Saunders and Joel Wuthnow, “Large and in Charge: Civil-Military Relations Under Xi Jinping,”
in Saunders, ed., Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA: Assessing Chinese Military Reforms, pp. 528-537.
195
David M. Finkelstein, Initial Thoughts on the Reorganization and Reform of the PLA (Arlington, VA:
CNA, 2016), p. 19, https://www.cna.org/cna_files/pdf/DOP-2016-U-012560-Final.pdf.
196
“China’s Most Senior Officials Endorse Economic Plans for Years Ahead; But They Left One Little
Thing Out,” The Economist, October 31, 2020, https://economist.com/china/2020/10/31/chinas-most-
senior-officials-endorse-economic-plans-for-years-ahead
197
Laura Silver, Kat Devlin, and Christine Huang, “Unfavorable Views of China Reach Historic Highs
in Many Countries,” Pew Research Center, October 6, 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/glob-
al/2020/10/06/unfavorable-views-of-china-reach-historic-highs-in-many-countries/.
198
For example, Australia forcefully called for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19
that resulted in a WHO World Health Assembly draft resolution supported by more than 100 countries.
However, the resolution was passed with watered-down language that did not directly identify China
as the virus’s source. See Ankit Panda, “Australian World Health Assembly Effort to Promote Inquiry
on COVID-19 Origins Wins Wide Support,” The Diplomat, May 18, 2020, https://thediplomat.
com/2020/05/australian-world-health-assembly-effort-to-promote-inquiry-on-covid-19-origins-winswide-support/.
See also Irwin Cotler and Judith Abitan, “Xi Jinping’s China Did This,” The Times of
Israel, April 12, 2020, https://www.timesofisrael.com/criminality-and-corruption-reign-in-xi-pings-
china/.
199
Minxin Pei, “China’s Coming Upheaval,” Foreign Affairs, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/
united-states/2020-04-03/chinas-coming-upheaval. Pei writes that the coronavirus crisis shows how the
CCP leaders under Xi have become “constrained by the rigidities of their own system and therefore limited
in their ability to correct policy mistakes.
200
George Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” February 22, 1946; and “X” (George F. Kennan), “The Sources
of Soviet Conduct,” Foreign Affairs, Vol 25, No. 4 (July 1947), https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/
russian-federation/1947-07-01/sources-soviet-conduct.
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