CHINA BUYS INFLUENCE WHILE PREPARING FOR WAR


Photo by Caireen Burns

“The supreme act of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”

-The Art of War

Introduction

John Ratcliffe, the former Director of National Intelligence, was quoted in the Wall Street Journal in December 2020, “China poses the greatest threat to America today, and the greatest threat to democracy and freeedom world-wide since World War II. The intelligence is clear. Beijing intends to dominate the U.S. and the rest of the planet economically, militarily and technologically.”

Military Buildup

Beijing has the most powerful Navy and Air Force in the Pacific region. China has transformed what was an obsolete military into one that can challenge the U.S.

During a webinar hosted by the think tank “Hudson Institute” on February 16, retired Marine Major General Arnold Punaro said, “China has not only modernized their military, but they have quadrupled their military. We are spending more on our military in constant dollars than during the peak of the Reagan buildup, yet our fighting force is 50 percent smaller. We are drowning in beauracracy and waste.”

Admiral John Aquilino, commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific, has given several warnings about China.

On May 17, in a statement before Congress, Aquilino said, “The Chinese seek to become a global military power and acquire the ability to seize Taiwan, while developing conventional weapons that can reach the U.S. homeland.”

On June 24, Aquilino said that China is undergoing the largest military buildup in their history. The buildup encompasses naval ships, aircraft, missiles and strategic nuclear capability.

Developing Nuclear Arsenal For Global Domination

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is building up its nuclear arsenal as part of a greater effort to undermine the West and create a new international order.

Peter Pry, a nuclear strategist specialist at the think tank “Center for Security Policy,” does not think China is building up its nuclear forces for deterrence but for global domination.

Pry said that U.S. leadership is too slow in adapting to the threat, in no small part because of the deep financial ties many American businesses have with China.

Pry warned that the United States has taken a “30-year holiday” in modernizing its own nuclear arsenal, providing China the time to develop capabilities to match and overcome U.S. defenses.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has expressed deep concerns about the rapid growth of China’s nuclear arsenal. Blinken noted Beijing’s sharp deviation from its decades of nuclear strategy based on minimum deterrence.

Hypersonic Missile

At a press conference in Geneva last year, U.S. disarmament ambassador Robert Wood said that Washington is concerned about China’s deployment of hypersonic weaponry which the United States had not developed a means of countering.

Unlike a traditional intercontinental ballistic missile, that exits the atmosphere and reenters using a predictable arc, the hypersonic missile “glides” to a target on a low orbit before striking. The missile has no arc that can be intercepted.

Control Of The South China Sea

The CCP lays claim to almost all of the South China Sea, despite a 2016 ruling by an international court finding its territorial claims were unlawful. The South China Sea is one of the world’s major shipping routes.

According to U.S. Indo-Pacific commander Admiral John Aquilino, at least three of the islands have been fully militarized by China with anti-ship and anti-aircraft missile systems.

Global Dominance Through Seaport Control

China has been developing a strategy to take control of seaports across the globe.

In addition to being home to 7 of the 10 busiest ports in the world, China either controls or has major investments in all 15 of the worlds top 15 ports.

China also has the world’s second-largest fleet of commercial shipping vessels and has surpassed the U.S. in terms of total battle ships.

Control Of International Organizations

The CCP is actively working to exert greater influence over global bodies such as the United Nations.

China a obtained leadership positions on 4 of 15 United Nations specialized agencies.

Buying American Elites With Lucrative Deals

According to Peter Schweizer, author of the book “Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China,” the CCP relies on a strategy of buying powerful figures in American politics and business to extend its influence.

The strategy is to buy off the elites in the United States by giving them lucrative deals and special access to the Chinese market,” Schweizer says.

It encompasses the biggest names on Wall Street, Silicon Valley and Washington D.C. Wall Street and Silicon Valley have received billion-dollar deals with China.

The Biden family has received tens of millions of dollars from CCP-linked businesses. President Biden recently returned the favor by selling a million barrels of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve to the CCP.

Biden has assured Americans he was going to use oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to lower gas prices, which have soared to record highs.

Stealing U.S. Defense Technology

The CCP has engaged in a protracted effort to systematically infiltrate U.S. defense bases and steal critical technologies. The strategy is “target, copy and transfer.”

A Chinese group recently paid millions of dollars to buy a large tract of farmland in North Dakota. This farmland is just 20 minutes from the Grand Forks Air Force Base.

In an April memo, Air Force Major Jeremy Fox wrote, “Some of the most sensitive elements of Grand Forks exist with the digital uplinks and downlinks inherent with unmanned air systems. Passive collection of those signals would be undetectable and poses a grave vulnerability to our Defense installations.”

Conclusion

Chad Wolf, then Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, warned in a speech in December 2020 in Washington D.C. that “the CCP views the United States as a political and ideological threat and seeks to destroy the United States. Our struggle with the CCP is nothing short of a civilizational conflict.”

Photo by Caireen Burns

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