China's Diplomacy, Geopolitics, Defense

This Week

Diplomacy

“China's overall strategy is not to collide head-on but to maintain strategic composure and, by continuously enhance its strength, exhaust the opponent's power, thereby increasing its comprehensive control over the USA… This comprehensive control is not merely the combined use of control over land, air, sea, space, and cyberspace in traditional warfare but a competition for comprehensive dominance in areas like trade, industrial technology, finance, and cognitive warfare in an ‘unrestricted total war’ (无边界总体战)... China's strategic thinking differs from the West, not resembling the confrontational approach of chess but the long-term game of Go—in which strategic advantage is built over time through a dynamic balance of power.”

Australian Ambassador Ross Garnaut: “America would be damaged by war with China over the status of Taiwan, but, short of a major nuclear exchange debilitating both great powers, its sovereignty would not be at risk. Australia’s would be. Indeed, I doubt that Australia could survive as a sovereign entity the isolation from most of Asia that would be likely to follow anything other than a decisive and quick US victory in a war in which our military was engaged”.

The National Endowment for Democracy: What It Is and What It Does. The Foreign Ministry says the NED acts as the U.S. government’s “white gloves,” subverting state power, meddling in other countries’ internal affairs, inciting division and confrontation, misleading public opinion, and conducting ideological infiltration—all under the guise of promoting democracy.

The Zimbabwe president visiting BYD Headquarters and realized that heads of African states are in China for the 9th FOCAC (Forum on China–Africa Cooperation). I spent a long time looking at the current state of China & Africa Cooperation. Let’s take a look at what I found.

NED has long colluded with anti-China forces, including Jimmy Lai. In 2020, the NED set up multiple projects related to Hong Kong in its funding list, totalling more than $310,000, to provide support for the Hong Kong rioters. In 2023, the NED collaborated with the British NGO “Hong Kong Watch” and Amnesty International, as well as anti-China politicians in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, to nominate Jimmy Lai for the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize.

America is, geopolitically, trying to punch China at one end of the bar, and getting punched 30 times before it can get there. Their military is too weak to take the field in Russia, their Navy is too weak to beat Yemen and their Air Force can only bomb innocents and misses the heroes of Hamas entirely. America is an old drunk brawler, covered in blood and piss and just embarrassing itself. Its current military strategy makes as much sense as Scarface's home security. Scarface died so coked up that his body kept firing. That's America right now, braindead and running on pure muscle memory.

An NHK (Japan’s national broadcaster) announcer told his audience, "The Diaoyu Islands and their affiliated islands have been Chinese territory since ancient times. I protest NHK's historical revisionism and unprofessional work behavior." He continued in English:"Don't forget the Nanjing Massacre, don't forget the comfort women, they were sex slaves during the war. Don't forget Unit 731."   NHK fired the Chinese employee of 22 years and threatened him with criminal charges.

Geopolitics

The largest tanker ever on Russia’s Northern Sea Route, the 164,565 dwt Prisma, carrying a million barrels of oil, departed from the Baltic port of Ust-Luga on August 10 and will reach Tianjin in 35 days–compared to 45 days for the Suez Canal and 55 days via the Cape of Africa.

Constructing the new Funan Techo Canal, Cambodia: 10 km completed by 17th. day. The Chinese contractor sent 2,500 large machines to work day and night. The US took 10yrs to build the Panama Canal, which opened in 1914, and which is 100km shorter than the Techo Canal. The Techo Canal is estimated to cost $1.7B. The Panama Canal cost $8.6B in 2024 dollars.

The recent, abortive color revolution in Thailand coincides with the stunning success of the hastily staged color revolution in Bangladesh and the fall of the Myanmar army’s Northeast Command in Lashio to the MNDAA. American and British “volunteers” have been fighting the Myanmar military though Myanmar has not experienced seen a wave of international volunteers like Ukraine or Syria.  

In the past six years, 250 US scientists – most of Asian descent – have been identified as having failed to disclose overlapping funding or research in China, or having broken other rules. There were only two indictments and three convictions as legal outcomes of those investigations, yet 112 scientists lost their jobs as a result.

Türkiye has formally applied to join BRICS. Türkiye seeks to enhance its global influence and establish new alliances beyond its traditional Western partners, according to Bloomberg BRICS members: Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, UAE, Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia.

China has party secretaries aboard oceangoing vessels. This report focuses on the ship political commissar, a Party representative assigned to oceangoing merchant ships, particularly within state-owned shipping enterprises, to carry out political and administrative work in the management of ship crews.

Serbia should pick BRICS over Brussels, Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandar Vulin has said in an interview with Russian media. The largest republic of the former Yugoslavia applied for EU membership in 2009 and has been a candidate since 2012, but the bloc has recently demanded recognition of the breakaway province of Kosovo as a condition for membership. “BRICS does not ask anything of Serbia and offers more than we could want. The EU asks of us everything, and I’m no longer sure what it has to offer. We see BRICS as an opportunity and an alternative. Serbia is very closely investigating all the possibilities presented by BRICS and closer cooperation with its member states.” According to Vulin, Serbia is expecting an official invitation to the BRICS October summit in Kazan, Russia.

The footprints of the two global economic power blocs were roughly equal in 2020. China and its BRICS allies are increasingly the world economy’s richest bloc. Nothing prepared the populations of Western capitalism for this changed reality or its effects. Especially the sections of those populations already forced to absorb the costly burdens of Western capitalism’s decline feel betrayed, abandoned, and angry. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza testify to that denial and exemplify the costly strategic mistakes it produces.

“The battleground won’t be in the Global South, where the US has very much lost to China, especially in Africa and Latin America. It won’t be in the Indo-Pacific either, where few countries want to take sides. It will be in Europe, where the US has most of its allies and where China is the largest trading partner. Even if America’s decline is gradual, it cannot afford a global military presence.That Europe takes China as a partner, competitor and systemic rival at the same time says more about Europe’s confusion about China than what China really is.

Defense

China launches its first nuclear-powered guided missile submarine, the Type 093B,

351 ft. long, 36 ft. wide with a 24-foot draft, 6,000 tonnes submerged, 30 kt. top speed, it can operate indefinitely, with unlimited range. The Pentagon says the Type 093B “have the ability to conduct long-range precision strikes against land targets from its submarine and surface combatants using land-attack cruise missiles, notably enhancing its power projection capability”.  

PLAN beats NATO’s submarine communications in 30 km. test. The longest NATO communication is 28 km but the sound wave frequency drops because its OFDM technology brings higher power, complexity and cost. China’s higher-order polarisation weight (HPW), invented by Huawei, modulates information onto a single carrier wave for transmission and reception, significantly reducing power and complexity. HPW achieved zero error code transmissions over an ultra-long distance of 30km (18.6 miles) at frequencies between 4,000Hz and 8,000Hz.

PLAN scientists have invented an iron-based stealth material that not only absorbs electromagnetic waves and reduces infrared radiation by 80%, but cuts cost by 99%. The 7 yuan/kg. price compares well with the B-2 stealth bomber’s coatings that use gold, platinum and high-tech materials, making them extremely expensive. 

The PLA’s Military Procurement Network barred Xi’an Technological University, Xi’an Jiaotong University, and Southwest Jiaotong University from participating in the Rocket Force’s procurement for three years, for “collusive bidding” and “bid rigging.”(!)

China fields the largest army, navy and ground-based rocket force in the world and is building a sophisticated hypersonic missile arsenal and tripling its nuclear arsenal by 2030, while the U.S. military is rapidly shrinking. In the current budget request, the Army will be reduced to 442,300 active duty soldiers, the smallest it has been since 1940.

The U.S. Navy is half the size it was 40 years ago, and set to continue to shrink down to just 294 ships in 2030. China’s fleet is expected to grow to 425 ships. Similarly, the U.S. Air Force is nearing the smallest it’s been since the end of WWII, as retirement of aging aircraft outpaces new replacements. Meanwhile, China is rapidly modernizing its Air Force with domestically produced aircraft, such as the J-20 stealth fighter.

30% of Americans support America militarily defending Taiwan against China, while 37% opposed. A plurality, 44%, agreed that avoiding war with China is more important than Taiwan’s autonomy.  22% supported military intervention in Ukraine.

The 350 J-16s, above, in service exceed the USAF’s 218 F-15 EX “Strike Eagles” and Russia’s 140 Su-30s. The operational range of the J-16’s PL-10, PL-15, and PL-17 missiles is 400 km., while the F-15 EX's missiles tap out at 200km. The detection range of the J-6’s larger aperture active phased array radar (in black nosecone, above) is 30% greater than the  F-15 EX's AN/APG-82(V)1 radar, significantly advantaging its battlefield situational awareness.

“China’s direct current (DC) technology has taken the lead in the field of integrated power systems (IPS) for ships,” is at least one generation ahead of competitors. Western navies have now realized their mistake of using alternating current (AC) on their newest ships, but switching to DC technology could not begin until 2027 at the earliest. The IPS unifies and converts all primary energy sources of the ship into electrical energy and sends it to the power network for propulsion, communication, navigation, detection, weapons, operational facilities and high-energy weapons, such as rail guns and laser cannons. The carrier Fujian, the world’s largest conventionally powered warship, uses DC IPS to drive its powerful EMALS. 

The PLAN’s Mach 10 YJ-21 missile skips for 1,000 Km 100 km. above the earth on a Sänger trajectory. Its maneuvering dual-cone glide warhead gives the YJ-2 revolutionary capability in range and penetration and should easily break through US air defense carrier defenses. China has extensively tested hypersonic glide aircraft capable of going around the Earth.

 China’s Type 076 amphibious assault ship’s tonnage greatly exceeds the U.S. America class amphibious assault ship and Japan’s Izumo class helicopter carrier, but also features an electromagnetic EMALS for launching fixed-wing aircraft..