Category: Thinking About China

China’s Military Budget: Smaller Increases but Not Smaller Ambitions

Commentary China announced on March 5 that it would increase its defense budget by 7.1 percent in 2022, to 1.45 trillion yuan ($230.16 billion). This is Beijing’s largest annual increase in military expenditures in three years. Chinese defense spending increased by 6.8 percent in 2021 and 6.6 percent in 2020. The last time China increased its…


CCP Exposes Its Fascist Nature Through the Chained Woman Case

Commentary For more than 20 years, she was chained, beaten, and gang raped. Her teeth were pulled out with pliers and the tip of her tongue was cut off. She was treated as a birthing tool and bore eight children. She likely suffered more than what we know, but the regime will not tolerate the…


Putin Should Reverse Course to Save Russia’s Strategic Interests

Commentary Russian leader Vladimir Putin has gotten himself into a strategic hole with his invasion of Ukraine. He is determined to keep digging, that is, sustaining and escalating the war with Kyiv. That is a critical mistake for two reasons. First, as war continues his isolation grows. Second, this leaves him with only one great…


How Ukraine May Have Saved Communist China

Commentary Russia’s war with Ukraine saved the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its People’s Republic of China (PRC). The isolation of Russia as part of the U.S.-led global information warfare campaign has driven Russia “back into the arms of Beijing,” just as China’s economy was imploding, and China desperately needed Russian energy and food. So…


Xi Reminds the Chinese People That Their Fealty Is to the CCP Amid Russia-Ukraine War

News Analysis While the conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues to expand and grow more unpredictable, Beijing has taken the opportunity to reaffirm the one true guiding consideration in all of its policy stances, foreign or domestic: the primacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and the necessary fealty that is subsequently demanded of its…


China’s Ballooning Defense Budget

News Analysis China’s defense budget will likely increase by approximately 7.1 percent this year, more than last year and the year before, and more than its expected GDP increase. Beijing is apparently on the warpath, even as U.S. defense budgets have declined over 10 percent over the last decade, and could decline further under President…


Does China Have the Skilled Personnel to Invade Taiwan?

Commentary The poor performance of Russian soldiers in Ukraine suggests Taiwan will have a key edge against any Chinese invasion. Russian soldiers have been suffering morale problems since the war with Ukraine started. Before the war, analysts described Russian soldiers as undertrained, undersupplied, short-term conscripts that are brutally hazed. According to U.S. observers, in combat that…


Japan Intensifying Its Stance Against China Amid Russia-Ukraine War

News Analysis Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has called for the United States to publicly state whether or not U.S. forces would fight for Taiwan. He also suggested that Japan should host nuclear weapons amid threats from North Korea, China, and possibly Russia. In a direct response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Abe on…


China Engulfs the Gulf: Should the US Be Concerned?

Commentary In January of this year, the foreign ministers of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, and Saudi Arabia, along with Nayef Falah M. Al-Hajraf, the secretary-general of the Gulf Cooperation Council, paid a visit to China. They made the trip for one reason and one reason only: to discuss furthering trade and security agreements with Beijing. As Axios reported at…


Ukraine: A Cautionary Tale for China?

Commentary Could a Russian victory in Ukraine embolden China to invade Taiwan? Certainly many think so. But Moscow’s experiences in Ukraine are more likely to serve as a cautionary tale for Beijing when it comes to contemplating military operations against Taiwan. Russia’s botched invasion of Ukraine has many lessons for China. The first and most…