Month: October 2022

If Taiwan Is The Next Ukraine, Better Start Studying

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Source: China Protests US Navy, Coast Guard Ships in Taiwan Strait, VOA

My last blog post made reference to a RAND study on perceptions of U.S. space programs in both Russia and China. The report noted how much more difficult it is for people in the West to understand Chinese attitudes and beliefs. Indeed, the authors could not even select ten space developments in recent decades that were seen as significant by Chinese publications they studied.

As U.S. warmongers clearly signal their intention to use Taiwan to weaken China

in a move analogous to using Ukraine to weaken Russia, it’s time for me to do some studying.

Since information rather than propaganda is so hard to come by these days, I’ve compiled a digest that goes partway toward addressing that problem. I don’t read Chinese so I’ll have to rely on English translations or, in some cases, messaging prepared with a Western audience in mind.

I acknowledge that this is a very incomplete list of worthwhile readings, so I welcome your feedback and further suggestions in the comments.

China digest

outsider perspectives

Taiwan and the making of an ‘Asian NATO’ – Monthly Review Online, Danny Haiphong

China chip ban a US exercise in extreme self-harm – Asia Times, David P. Goldman

Countries struggling against US domination are inevitably turning to China – Friends of Socialist China, Margaret Kimberley

‘China knows it’s getting stronger’ George Yeo on US-China tensions – South China Morning Post, Talking Post with Yonden Lhatoo

‘Peaceful modernization’: China’s offering to the Global South – The Cradle, Pepe Escobar

Screenshot from a video of former Communist Party of China (CPC) Chairman Hu Jintao, age 79, being removed from the closing day of the 20th National Congress of the CPC. Xi Jinping is seated to his left when a man in a mask comes to escort Hu out.

The interpretations of this odd event are indicative of 1) the difficulty for Westerners to understand what’s going on in China and 2) the often knee-jerk hostility where most commenters assumed this was like a Mafia hit or purge.  Other commenters said: Hu has Alzheimers and may have needed someoe to attend to his personal hygiene. 

It is well nigh impossible for me to know the truth of what happened. So, I’ll keep reading.

Chinese perspectives

Hold High the Great Banner of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics and Strive in Unity to Build a Modern Socialist Country in All Respects – Report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, October 16, 2022, Xi Jinping

Special report on the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China – People’s Daily Online (in Google English translation, for what it’s worth)

‘Who Am I,’ video about CPC’s growth, purposes and goals, goes viral – Global Times

Who Am I? – YouTube

Congested & Contested: Space Wars Are Upon Us

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Free download here


When the Pentagon’s think tank, the RAND corporation, publishes a study it’s worth paying attention. Remarkable in their prescience, RAND reports accurately predicted the Ukraine war and the Iraq war. 

Consider, for instance, their recent study of what Chinese and Russian primary sources had to say about 10 key events in the U.S. space program 1985-2011. The authors described how the U.S. had others on the planet riled up by

the establishment of the U.S. Space Force in 2019, and multiple policy and warfighting documents have rapidly followed. Given this activity and the concerns raised in domestic and international fora[sic] regarding the increasingly congested and contested nature of space, there has been surprisingly little open-source analysis of Chinese and Russian perceptions of these developments. [emphasis mine]

Findings included that neither Russia nor China appears to believe U.S. space programs are not military in nature (no kidding), and that the U.S. unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty in 2002 was viewed by both as a turning point after which a more aggressive stance was evident

Here’s the list of all the events for which reactions were collected:

• Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) (1983) and U.S. Space Command creation (1985) 

• President Bill Clinton’s National Space Policy (1996) 

• Mid-Infrared Advanced Chemical Laser (MIRACL) test (1997) 

• Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and 

Organization (“Rumsfeld Commission”) (2001) 

• U.S. withdrawal from Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty (2002) 

• U.S. Air Force (USAF) Counterspace Operations doctrine (2004) 

• President George W. Bush’s National Space Policy (2006) 

• Operation Burnt Frost (2008) 

• President Barack Obama’s National Security Space Policy (2011) 

RAND also observed that Russia had more national pride invested in space technology and achievements, while China appeared to study Western space tech mostly with an eye to understanding it. They did not necessarily want to build something better themselves. However, China did successfully shoot down their own satellite recently after the U.S. did so in 2008.

The authors appeared to believe it was harder for Americans to understand Chinese nuance and societal expectations than Russian attitudes. For instance, some of the events on their list of 10 were little noted at all in Chinese publications they surveyed, while other events not on the list received significant attention in “native-language primary sources, such as..government publications, military journals, academic reports, and domestic media.”

RAND also appeared to be setting up conditions for further curtailments of free speech in the U.S. and Europe as there were multiple references to China and Russia taking note of Western voices critical of their own countrys’ space programs. 

Draconian anti-protest laws  just passed in the UK are a harbinger, no doubt, as the declining West struggles to manage the narrative.

From the What’s Happening feed on my Twitter account this morning:

A report from 2000 may be of interest too. With it looking like Taiwan could become the next Ukraine, maybe I’ll find time to read RAND’s Dire Strait: Military Aspects of the China-Taiwan Confrontation and Options for U.S. Policy.