My generation came of age during the Cold War and China was seen as a huge, impoverished odd duck in those years. In the late 1970s, China began slowly opening to the West. Change unfolded gradually but by the 1990s, powerful people wanted to bring China into the modern world, and China wanted to join it. Take advantage was more likely.
And how dangerous is the Chinese Communist Party? The Soviets themselves had at one point contemplated launching nuclear strikes on China! If that doesn’t say it all nothing I say will.
Understand this. China’s total GDP in 1980 was under $90 billion in current US Dollars. Today, it is over $12 trillion! The world has never seen such enormous economic growth in such a short time. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union collapsed and the internet was born. The US, as sole superpower, saw opportunities everywhere. American businesses shifted production to lower-cost countries. Thus came the incredible extension of globalization.
We in the Western world thought (somewhat arrogantly, in hindsight) everyone else wanted to be like us. It made sense. Our ideas, freedom, and technology had won both World War II and the Cold War that followed it. Obviously, our ways were best. Best for exploitation that is as far as the CCP was concerned.
Grand dreams of world domination are part and parcel of communist ideologies, going all the way back to Karl Marx. For the Chinese, this blends with the country’s own long history. It isn’t always clear to Western minds whether they actually believe the rhetoric or simply use it to keep the peasantry in line. But Xi Jinping really sees this as China’s destiny, and himself as the leader who will deliver it.
To that end, the Chinese manipulated Western politicians and business leaders into thinking China was evolving toward democracy and capitalism. In fact, the intent was to acquire our capital, technology, and other resources for use in China’s own modernization. They adapted and rebranded the Capitalist model. Today’s Chinese communists are nowhere near Mao’s kind of Communism for sure, but they are still hardcore Maoists.
China appears to be a dynamic capitalistic market, but is also a totalitarian, top-down structure with rigid rules and social restrictions. Xi calls it “Socialism with a Chinese character,“ but it goes beyond the national borders of China. The CCP has a detailed strategy to overtake the US as the world’s dominant power. They want to do this by 2049, the centennial of China’s Communist revolution.
And what is the U.S. strategy to counter China’s aggressive plans for world domination? Unfortunately for us, the societal controls applied to the Chinese people appeals to too many of our elected leaders, particularly those from the Democrat party. Some Rhinos included. Corporations care about nothing but profits and access to China‘s markets.
So here we are, our economy now hardwired to a totalitarian regime that has no interest in becoming like us. It only cares about exploiting our intellectual and military technology to someday overtake us on the world stage and subsequently, establish a world-wide Communist government ruled by the CCP.
I will conclude with this warning. China‘s military, is the only military in the world, arming and training for one specific purpose. Fighting the United States.