The Strategic Outlook: China’s End Around

Since the fall of the former Soviet Union, the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) has filled the gap as the world’s second superpower challenging US power and influence in the world. Unlike the former Soviet Union however, China has refused to engage the West toe to toe in a logistical struggle based on a military industrial complex fed by a true free market and whose benchmarks are measured in qualitative and advanced technological terms. In other words, China unlike the former Soviet Union, will not attempt to fight the US on its own terms, rather it will engage in a form of “unrestricted” warfare that has no rules and one that China has been familiar with for three thousand years.

Observers and pundits in the US may dispute the idea of China at present having attained true superpower status, claiming it to be a possibility in the near future. However, this observation is probably viewed from an entirely Western lens; one that measures success by how many high tech jet fighters, tanks, ICBM’s and aircraft carriers one has. The perspective Westerners often incorporate when engaging the East and China in particular, comes from a “top down” or big picture approach. The Chinese, North Koreans, Vietnamese etc., however are “bottom up” or small picture thinkers; that is not a bad thing, just imagine the builders of the Giza Pyramid or the Great Wall of China. In the case of the 4,600 year old Pyramid of Giza, most modern western engineers concede that this feat could not be replicated today.Most Americans are taught when growing up that people are “basically the same all over the world”. Unfortunately, this could not be further from the truth and usually results in holding non westerners to the same standards that we are accustomed to. Again, this is not a qualitative assessment but rather a recognition of differences Applying one’s own values to non western cultures is often referred to as “mirror imaging” and is one of the most common mistakes Western analysts make when conducting regional threat assessments. Misperceptions lead to poor analysis.

China has so far been very successful in countering Western influence in the Far East and has won the propaganda war in the court of public opinion. Proxy dictatorships such as North Korea, North Vietnam, Burma, and Cambodia rely on China in order to survive and have firmly established Communist or Marxist rule, shutting out the West. This is clearly evidenced by the inability to hold on to North Korea in 1950, the loss of South Vietnam in 1975, Britain and Portugal’s loss of Hong Kong and Macao respectfully, the US refusal to provide overt assistance and recognition Tibet and Taiwan, even though they would like to. The most recent frustration the United States has encountered in the Far East related to the inability to provide USAID and help to the hundreds of thousands of cyclone victims in Burma due to the brutal military junta that is currently in power.

This alliance of Asian Communist nations have combined to brutally murder many tens of millions of their own countrymen since the late 1940’s, and ruthlessly repressed any element that swayed from the Party line. Today hundreds of thousands of their own people, even by the most conservative of estimates in China, North Korea and Burma, rot in gulags and are subjected to torture, forced labor and privation by the military and secret police (1). Even Hitler and Stalin could not muster these kinds of numbers at home. China is currently engaging in a massive espionage and cyber warfare program against the US that would have made the most hardcore Cold War Soviet KGB Director blush with envy. By some accounts, China has over 100,000 spies at various levels in the US reporting to handlers in what is referred to in the intelligence business as the “vacuum cleaner approach” to espionage.

China has also supported Pakistan’s and Iran’s development of nuclear weapons and the acquisition of advanced ballistic missile technology. China’s key proxy, North Korea has provided resources, training and personnel to Syria in assistance to the proliferation of WMD and missile technology (2). China has secretly trained, equipped and funded al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan before and after 9/11. On the African continent, China provides training, weaponry and resources to the brutal dictatorships in Sudan, Somalia and Zimbabwe In South America, China provides active support to the Marxist regimes of Venezuela, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Argentina and Ecuador; establishing economic and military outposts as well as port facilities run by Hutchinson and Whampoa Limited (a Peoples Liberation Army front company operation) in Latin America and the Bahamas.

Clearly, this kind of relationship vis a vis the US and Communist China would have never transpired during the Cold War. Despite all this egregious behavior toward the West and having the worst record on human rights in world history, China has managed to host the 2008 Olympics, engage in one of the most lopsided trading relationships in history, lure trillions of dollars in Western business investments (most from the US) and get a free pass from the US Government as well as Western European countries like Great Britain, France and Germany on key issues such as the proliferation of WMD, nuclear weapons and ballistic missile technology and terrorist support.

This unbalanced relationship between East and West has occurred because of three basic reasons; narcissism and greed, hubris, and ignorance. The lure of cheap goods and consumables, the infiltration of our government at the highest levels by Chinese spies, the computer hacking of our nations defense systems from mainland China, the buying off of notable DC Beltway veterans by Chinese lobbyists, China’s military, political and economic entrenchment in Latin America and the importation of illegal narcotics from the Far East through Mexico by Chinese criminal cartels have all served to undermine and diminish the social, political and economic fabric of the United States (3).

These actions and strategies by China are all a part of their policy of Unrestricted Warfare also known as Fourth Generation Warfare (4GW) in the West. Fourth Generation Warfare (4GW) is a comprehensive and holistic strategy, attacking a nation’s social, political, economic and cultural fabric rather than engage in classic military warfare (4). It involves the use of lies, propaganda and disinformation fueled by the media and the internet towards government policies as well as methods of insurgency, terrorism, infiltration, espionage and political subversion. China’s warfare strategy can be summed up in the famous works of Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu, The Art of War during the Fifth Century BC. Another document dated around 200 BC titled the Thirty Six Stratagems (of Chinese Warfare) is a handbook on the art of deception, which Sun Tzu states, “Deception is the Tao of warfare” (5).

Most of the concepts of unrestricted warfare center on defeating a nation from within without ever firing a shot. The principles illustrated in these ancient documents have proven to be effective in the twentieth century by those who have implemented them such as Mao Tse Tung, Ho Chi Minh and the terrorist organization Hezbollah, who for all intents and purposes run the government of Lebanon after only a few years of political infiltration and terrorist intimidation.

Explaining the dynamics of successful 4GW can be best illustrated by the analogy of the “boiling frog” scenario. In this case a frog is placed in a seemingly non threatening environment such as a short lipped saucer plate filled with cool water. Unbeknownst to the frog, the saucer is located under a electric stove coil. The frog can easily jump from the saucer of water any time it feels the need. When the heating coil is activated, the temperature is increased one degree per minute giving the frog time to acclimate to the temperature. Once the temperature reaches a certain level, it is clear to those on the outside that the frog is in danger but the frog still operating in his comfort zone does not recognize it. The temperature continues to increase gradually until the frog is literally boiled alive without the slightest protest.

Great civilizations and empires fall in much the same way and it is obvious that the Chinese understand this concept well and have been focusing their efforts to defeat the United States in the same manner. As incredulous as this may sound to some, it is not all that far fetched when one examines how Americans are “hard wired” today. The Age of Affluence in the 1960’s and 1970’s has transformed American society into a state of complacency by the 1990’s and 2000’s and its citizenry has exhibited a serious lack of national identity.

Another strategic weakness America exhibits are its politicians and their media enablers who operate in two, four and six year cycles and when not engaged in politics they are living the good life from of well funded lobbyists and raking in cash on the speaker circuit. There is nothing wrong with engaging in that kind of endeavor because it represents the free market However, the short cyclical nature exhibited by our politicians defines the limits of our national vision while the Chinese think in terms of decades and even centuries in order to implement a successful political strategy.

China’s current policy toward the US centers on strategic three focal points: (A) develop political and economic hegemony in Latin America and the Caribbean, securing control of ports of entry and exporting Marxist revolutions to these politically unstable countries, assuring an anti American coalition to the south and facilitating the importation of illegal narcotics into the US further undermining our country’s cultural and political foundation. (B) Inject economic capital in key areas in East Africa; undermine those governments friendly to the West, supporting dictatorships friendly to the East, and extracting valuable natural resources at the lowest possible cost. (C) To develop a line of proxy nations and allies in the Middle East including Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and Syria and developing overland oil pipelines from these countries into China. Accomplishing these goals would make it rather easy to later diminish US influence in the Pacific and the Far East, leaving Taiwan, South Korea and Japan at China’s mercy (6).

China has successfully played into America’s core weaknesses and like the frog in the saucer full of water, the US scarcely realizes the inherent danger of ignorance, hubris and narcissism. The only way traditional America will survive the first half of the twentieth century is to attack external threats by recognizing the internal struggles that continue to eat away at our political, social, economic, and uniquely American cultural fabric. The break down of the traditional American family, the growing absence of spirituality in American life, a continual erosion of our national identity, bitter political divisiveness and corruption in US politics, and the astronomical amount of debt accumulated by both the US Government and its citizenry has placed America in a very vulnerable position and at the mercy of our enemies. Only by recognizing these bitter facts, engage in an endeavor course correct and the willingness to see it through, can we pursue a united course of action that will put America back in her rightful place as a Nation of Nations and the world's best last hope.

Footnotes

1. Margolin, Jean Louis, 1999, Agence France Presse, Twentieth Century Atlas; Death Tolls; also Gertz, China Threat : The death tolls from China’s draconian policies from 1946 to the present day range from 45-78 million. These are conservative estimates from a much respected European source that is known for its objectivity in assessing China’s policies.

2. Gertz, Treachery

3. Poole, 2008, Dragon Days; John Poole’s books should be required reading for all those who wish to defeat the global insurgency. He is one of the very few observers who have a real handle on the true nature of the enemy and a clear plan for a winning strategy.

4. Liang, 2004, Unrestricted Warfare; This treatise, originally written in 1999 and translated by the CIA, explicitly mentions bombing the World Trade Center and the possibility of “a bombing attack by (Osama) bin Laden”, whose name by the way, is mentioned over twenty times in the text. It is odd that in bin Laden last recording, he adamantly makes the claim that it was al Qaeda alone that committed the 9/11 attacks (like we didn’t already know). Perhaps he was trying to quell any doubts that there might have been complicity by a budding national superpower (China) that might be providing resources and strategic guidance in its war against America..

5. Poole, 2005, Militant Tricks; This book outlines how the Islamic Militants use the Chinese Thirty Six Stratagems in Iraq and Afghanistan and shows to defeat them

6. Poole, 2007, Dragon Days

Bibliography

Gertz, Bill, 2004, Treachery, How America’s Friends and Foes are Secretly Arming Our Enemies, New York, Crown Forum

Gertz, Bill, 2000, The China Threat, New York, Crown Forum

Liang, Qiao (Colonel) and Xiangsui, Wang (Colonel), Peoples Liberation Army (China), 2004, Unrestricted Warfare: China’s Master Plan to Destroy America, translated from original Chinese documents, NewsMax Media Inc., online document

Morris, James, April 19, 2008, “Nation of Nations”, www.NewMediaJournal.us.com, online archive

Poole, H. John, 2007, Dragon days: Time for Unconventional Tactics, NC, Posterity Press

Poole, H. John, 2005, Militant Tricks: Battlefield Ruses of the Islamic Militant, NC, Posterity Press