The Chinese Threat Is Existential

It was bound to come to this. As usual, Washington’s administrative state has been diverting attention from the real problem by entertaining themselves with adolescent scary stories about Russia’s interference in our elections. As if…

This is a hot mess and it could become a radioactive hot mess in the not-too-distant future. Global warming is looming?? No, China is looming and looming large. Steve Bannon lays out the problem, a greater threat than the Soviet Union ever was, and we are much weakened by our elites who would sell us out for their own bottom lines:

The Center for Security Policy is sponsoring the ‘Committee on the Present Danger: China’ (CPDC). Its name harkens back to Soviet Russia and the now-dead Cold War.

From Bill Gertz at The Free Beacon:

China under Communist Party rule poses an existential threat and must be countered with stronger defense, economic, and political measures, according to a new committee of experts.

Former government, military, and intelligence leaders joined by business leaders and human rights advocates warned during an inaugural press briefing that Communist China poses the most dangerous threat to the United States and the world.

Creation of the Committee on the Present Danger-China follows three earlier iterations of the storied organization that played influential roles in American national security policy beginning in the 1950s and throughout the Cold War and after.

The panel includes a blue-ribbon roster of 43 experts including former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, former Education Secretary William Bennett, former Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence ret. Lt. Gen. Gerald Boykin, and former Rep. Frank Wolf (R., Va.).

Other notable figures include University of Pennsylvania China specialist Arthur Waldron, strategic missile defense expert Henry Cooper, Chinese Christian activist Bob Fu, former Voice of America China broadcaster Sasha Gong, and retired Navy Capt. James Fanell, former intelligence director for the Pacific Fleet.

One of the first actions by the committee was to issue a warning on the anticipated U.S.-China trade deal that is said to be close to being completed.

“The trade deal the Trump administration is now negotiating with China is expected to address its Communist Party’s longstanding practice of stealing American intellectual property—the life-blood of our information-based economy and a key component of our national security,” the statement said.

“It remains to be seen whether any new commitments from the Chinese to end this practice will be honored since past ones have not.”

Frank Gaffney, vice chairman of the Committee, said even if a trade deal is reached and China honors its commitments, “we are still facing a world of hurt at their hands.”

“We must address these other dimensions of the problem that ultimately emanate from the character of the communist regime, mainly that it is ruled, brutally, in a totalitarian fashion, by the Chinese Communist Party,” Gaffney said.

Committee chairman Brian Kennedy said the independent, non-partisan group will seek to educate and inform the American public and government policymakers regarding the threat from China ruled by the Communist Party of China.

The threat includes a large-scale military buildup, active information and political warfare that targets the American people, business, political, and media elites, and Beijing’s aggressive cyber and economic warfare.

“The Committee takes no ideological point of view, rather it relies on the facts as reasonable people can understand them,” Kennedy said. “Armed with these facts, the Committee believes the common sense of the American people will demand from their elected officials that all reasonable measures be taken to defend the United States, our economic interests, and the security of the American people.”

Woolsey, former CIA director in the administration of Bill Clinton, said China is seeking to defeat the United States according to the dictums of the ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu—without having to engage in a major conflict.

“We have to be able to turn away Chinese domination of our Internet,” Woolsey said, noting efforts by China’s Huawei Technologies and other firms to control the emerging 5G telecommunications technology.

Boykin, undersecretary of defense for intelligence in the George W. Bush administration, said the Chinese intelligence threat has increased rapidly and through cyber attacks stolen or reverse-engineered large amounts of advanced American technology.

The Chinese strategy against the United States was outlined in a 1999 book by two People’s Liberation Army colonels called Unrestricted Warfare. The book called for using all forms of warfare—military, diplomatic, economic, financial, and even terrorism—to win wars.

The book “laid out the absolute road-map for how they intended to take over America, and they are in the process of doing everything they said they wanted to do in that treatise,” Boykin said.

Boykin said a counterintelligence briefing he received at the Pentagon revealed Chinese intelligence agencies had planted spies throughout the United States.

As I’ve suggested in the past, learn Mandarin. Or teach it to your children. They may need it to survive in the future.

32 thoughts on “The Chinese Threat Is Existential

  1. “As I’ve suggested in the past, learn Mandarin. Or teach it to your children. They may need it to survive in the future.”

    I was born in the 1940’s and we were told in my lifetime to learn German, then Russian and Japanese because these countries were going to take over the world or something.

    At Harvard Business School in the late 1970’s we had case study after case study of the superior government planning by MITI in Japan and how stupid by comparison the US was for not having 100’s of genius bureaucrats picking winners and losers.

    Not saying you are wrong to learn Mandarin, just saying I have heard this line of reasoning somewhere before.

    Oh, I was a linguist and spy in the US Army in the 1960’s and was trained in some Slavic languages and then learned German. I need to learn a little Japanese and Chines I guess. I do like the Chinese words: baizuo and shengmu.

    • I learned this from my Chinese friend: “Wah shuh yang gwai tzuh” (approximately)…”I am ocean devil person”. I want to get that printed on a t-shirt in Chinese Pictograms. They call us “The Devils from across the ocean”. Check it out.

    • Meh, this propaganda is for the children. Any one of our vintage still has critical thinking skills, a memory and an attention span longer than a goldfish’s.

      Go fishing, that’s what I do, and watch the world burn. It’s not like we don’t live in a world far worse than 1984 envisioned already. It’s a world that the Nazis or Stalin would have wet their pants to have but didn’t have the tech.

      It’s amazing how the Overton window has moved so far, the population of domesticated animals doesn’t even notice.

  2. As I’ve commented previously, Steve Bannon was the architect of the Trump victory, and oversaw the early Trump Presidency’s commitment to his campaign promises.
    https://www.amazon.com/Kushner-Inc-Ambition-Corruption-Extraordinary-ebook/dp/B07DZYV8MM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2DHXIOVSKE54R&keywords=kushner+inc&qid=1557428579&s=gateway&sprefix=kushner%2Caps%2C150&sr=8-1

    Bannon left the administration under somewhat murky circumstances. I personally would say that Trump’s commitment is wobbling. Bannon mentioned costly, pointless wars, in which the US is engaging prolifically. I have not heard of US forces withdrawing from the 100 or so countries they were in, most of which US citizens would not be able to name. We’re still shoveling money into Afghanistan and Iraq, and look to be a whisper away from military action in Iran and Venezuela.

    I watched the Trump rally in Panama City, Fla. At the beginning of the speech, the crowd got into “Build that wall, build that wall”. Trump just kind of stood there, and went on with his speech. Towards the end of the speech, he went into full-blown campaign mode: illegals committing crime, chain migration, our need to control the border, etc. He did claim to be building 400 miles of fence, and mentioned that’s just the beginning. Yeah.

    What he didn’t mention was the $22 trillion US debt, of which China is the biggest bondholder. The US has a yearly deficit of over $1 trillion. How can you carry out significant actions against China when China is one of our biggest creditors?

    Here’s the scenario as I see it. The US has a built-in deficit, as a welfare, crony capitalist state. A deficit either means you’re borrowing or you’re creating inflation. So far, the credit of the US has been good. But, if the huge bondholders like China, demanded redemption of the bonds, the US would either have to default or flood the world with US paper dollars. Either way would trigger a huge inflation, which would blow whatever political party in power, out of power.

    To stop the penetration of China into US markets, manufacturing, technology and security, people in the US will have to endure higher prices. It’s cause and effect. China is subsidizing products and using low-wage labor, where any attempts at labor organizing meet harsh oppression. They’re bribing us. If the US can’t get control over its spending, we’ll be putty in the hands of the Chinese oligarchs.

    One example is US universities, which are useless money drains. The excepting is schools of engineering and science, which are flooded with Chinese nationals paying full, out-of-state tuition. The universities are so addicted to spending oceans of money, they fight against any proposal to limit Chinese enrollment.

    I’m with Bannon on publicizing and not cooperating with the Chinese oppression of free religion, Christians in particular. I’m agnostic on their crackdown on the Uighurs, Chinese Muslims, as it may, or may not, be a response to Uighur violent resistance movements. I’m inclined to leave it alone as an internal matter of the Chinese.

    Finally, I would like to learn more on the 5G dangers. I’ve been holding off on buying a phone for the Note 10, which will be 5G capable. I don’t know the security problems come with individual devices, or if they result from a government decision. I do know the Note 9, currently on the market, is a perfectly acceptable alternative for me.

    • The traditional method for dealing with excessive foreign debt has always been very simple: It’s called ‘repudiation’.
      When you can’t pay–you don’t.
      Kings, princes, dictators, democracies and whatevers have been happy to use it in the past, and I doubt that the future will be any different.
      Should our not-so-friendly Chink buddies get too frisky–as in right NOW in our trade talks–we can simply tell them to take their $22 trillion in IOUs and pound sand, or stick ’em where the sun don’t shine…………….their choice.

      Yeah, War–most likely.
      You mean you haven’t seen THAT ONE coming, either?

      • Yeah. Repudiation is always a possibility. But, then nobody will loan the government money and the government is faced with the same choices immediately: cut back on spending and infuriate all the people on the government dole; or print more money and go into (hyper)inflation. So, the choice has to be made one way or another, sooner rather than later if you repudiate your debts.

        Either way, people will be angry and the current government will likely be voted out of office. I remember hearing a report years ago on NPR about a South American country that repudiated its debts, but managed a soft landing through controlling its spending.

        • can’t deny that a good portion of the swamp depends on the transfer of means from the productive economy into the hands of bureaucrats.

          repudiate, control spending, and clean the swamp in one fell swoop.

          not seeing a problem there.

    • Place blame squarely on the sellout criminal CLINTON admin. Place additional blame on jackass Americans that keep buying Chinese crap. Way to go on that S. KOREA Note 10 consideration. What, no American made computer up to your satisfaction?

      5G is weapons-based. Millimeter spectrum same frequencies 6GHz -100GHz and above. Your sweat pores will act as antennas, allowing you to absorb even more radiation, enjoy!

      • Agree.

        Many of us can afford to pay a little more for domestically produced products.

        I research nearly every purchase to try to find what I need that is made anywhere in the Western world. Surprisingly, many items are available and are not often that much more expensive.

        I live in a strongly unionised city of autoworkers (at least what’s left of them after many factory closures). They had a big campaign to encourage people to buy domestic and had each worker put a big sticker on their cars “Out of a Job Yet? Keep Buying Foreign”

        The WalMart parking lots are always full of cars with these stickers with the owners returning to their cars with bags full of cheap Chinese junk.

        As my father says “Only the rich can afford to buy junk.”

        They can afford to replace it

      • Well, if you find a phone made in the US, let me know. I can’t.

        I have to see where the Note 10 is made when it comes out. If made in China, I might be satisfied with a Note 9, which isn’t. As far as the radiation, I keep radioactive devices away from my body. I either use the speaker on the phone, or I use earphones with physical cables. No bluetooth that close to my head, although holding a phone next to my head would be worse and isn’t going to happen.

        I would encourage you to keep plugging American products. There doesn’t appear to be any selection to choose from, unless my research skills are really mud.

        • Sometimes the best places to find US or European made products are specialty shops. Japanese products are also fairly well represented among certain types of products.

          If you need a frying pan, go to a restaurant or kitchen ware supply shop – you’ll find US made stainless steel pans or excellent cast iron US made pans that remain non-stick and will last for several generations.

          Need a faucet? Go to a plumbing supply shop or a kitchen and bath center. They’ll have US and Euro made faucets.

          The basic message is to shop as much as possible at specialty shops and industry suppliers. The popular Big Box stores are not where most contractors or most other commercial buyers go.

          You’d be surprised at what’s available. Not nearly the number of products that there used to be of course, but more than the average consumer realises. Prices are often not nearly as high as people assume either.

      • Perspicacious,

        Yep….the blame is squarely on Clinton, the 106th CONgress and the American fools who sold themselves down the drain, buying the Chicom product and keeping the seditious politicians in office.

  3. BTW, Chinese is being taught in SoCal elementary schools with the Ontario/Montclair School District and the Walnut (Walnut Valley) School District leading the charge.

  4. It appears to me that the US is in a manner of speaking a profitable vassal state to China. Presumably China helps to keep the US economy strong enough to continue its role as a massive customer for Chinese products. Preventing collapse of the US economy under the weight of debt or inflation is no doubt a priority for China. However, the debt is so incredibly large and growing that surely some major adjustments will have to be made in the future to prevent collapse. I imagine China will at some point begin to cash-in their bonds but in a manner that will not collapse the US. Perhaps massive forfeitures of US federal and state assests will occur? I see no other alternatives than for the US to allow itself to be increasingly dominated by China as the US may already be losing its political and financial clout with China. The bonds simply cannot be easily paid off without forfeiture of assets and even of some political control.

    The necessary and massively unpopular measures needed for the Federal and State governments to begin to truly address the deficits and debts would be political suicide, as Ron B states.
    I can only envision a future where China will be a sort of central gov’t for the US and will begin to enforce its own austerity measures to prevent collapse of the US economy. A relationship perhaps not unlike that of Greece and the EU central gov’t. US politicians will then have somewhat of an excuse to support and help implement such austerity if they could claim that it is not their own measures causing problems for the people but rather the Chinese gov’t or Chinese banks. An opportunity to deflect the blame and stay in power.

    • The forfeiture of assets is already happening in the form of asset sales to the Chinese and other countries. The debtors are buying universities, media stations, land, houses and apartments, lots of businesses, and loads of technology companies with plump stores of technical patents ripe for the picking.

      It’s like mortgaging and then selling your house to finance your vacations and parties. Eventually, your house is owned by someone else, and all you have to show is empty champagne glasses and some confetti.

      • It is concerning to hear of the extent of the sell-off. Is there anything to prevent this when so much is owed to China?

        • Yeah. Fiscal responsibility. Limit the items Chinese can buy to personal luxury items. This would lower the exchange rates, make US dollars less valuable, discourage the purchase of US dollars, raise the interest rates on borrowing US dollars. The result would be more expensive deficit financing by the US government, and consequently, more inflation as long as deficit spending is maintained.

          A country cannot maintain independence spending more than what it takes in.

          • china now owns smithfield, or more simply, one in for hogs for meat in the US.

          • Do you have the source for this?

            Smithfield is still a big name in Virginia hams…those dry-cured, soak-the-salt-out-for-days whole hams that required a special pot or a good meat ax.

    • Which part of this is a “sales pitch for a book”? This was the closing speech of the inaugural event – Frank Gaffney didn’t even let them break for lunch – which you can see if you look at the whole thing on YouTube.

      The Committee for the Present Danger: China is named after the original Committee for the Present Danger which addressed concerns about the Soviets back in the 20th century.

      This small section was the closing speech of the day-long inaugural briefing of the CPDC, which will continue to meet and strategize about what they consider to be an existential threat to the West. Go here for a list of the members, guiding principles, and that launch event, of which this short talk was the last part:

      https://presentdangerchina.org/2019/05/committee-on-the-present-danger-china-to-provide-threat-briefing-on-the-communist-partys-unrestricted-warfare/

  5. I don’t recall which UN documents I read, but the UN basically has stated that they would like China to play a major role in the implementation of the goals of Agenda 2030. I think the UN recognises the huge resources China has in manpower, industry and finances. China’s threat to the security of individual states, particularly Western nations, is no longer a concern of the UN so it is no wonder China is viewed simply as an excellent partner and not a danger.

    • China’s threat to the security of individual states, particularly Western nations, is no longer a concern of the UN…

      China is seen by the UN as the Great Equalizer. The UN has zero interest in sovereign states or their border security…

  6. If things go south for America, abolish the Fed… or so-called Fed Just a bunch of worthless Bankers… Let them eat their currency. What are the Chin[ese] going to do? Turn America into a Bill Collector?

    The Politicians in America started this [stuff] with their NAFTA and GATT deals. Good for them but not Americans. It is time Americans started making their own products again.

  7. That’s an American problem, not a European one. If America still manufactured plentiful of desirable peoducts, the trade deficit wouldn’t exist.
    Furthermore, America has no God-given right to military dominance over the South China Sea or other places far from the American mainland.

    • I wish you were right. However, this is a problem for all the West because China intends on taking hold of the economic reins for everything. Just as Soviet Russia intended.

      America doesn’t manufacture desirable products anymore because we were sold out by our elites, those Davos-dwellers who welcomed Xi Jinping to their annual party – the one Trump didn’t attend. And London is welcoming Huawei’s 5G technology…while other countries are banning it.

      https://wapo.st/2Js5HFo

      China’s premier telecommunications company, Huawei, has risen to power through a combination of force, fraud and coordination with the Chinese Communist Party. Huawei has stolen valuable technology — and has allegedly stolen more, including the recent case of a high-tech robot arm — to get a leg up on the competition.

      Now, Huawei is constructing a global network of undersea Internet cables and next-generation mobile networks that could give China effective control of the digital commanding heights.

      ——

      The African Union learned the hard way to be wary of strangers bearing gifts. Its $200 million headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, was a “gift” financed, constructed and outfitted by China with Huawei servers. Last year, African Union engineers alleged those servers had funneled massive amounts of sensitive data to China every night for years — a stunning cybertheft reportedly supplemented by old-fashioned listening devices found in the walls of the Chinese-built facility. The African Union was forced to replace its servers and implement new security measures at great expense. It declined an offer from Huawei engineers to configure the new system; once burned, twice shy.

      The African Union’s experience with Huawei should put to rest uninformed claims that Chinese telecoms don’t pose a security threat. But if that isn’t enough to convince our European friends, they should note how the countries closest to China’s gravitational pull are acting to preserve the integrity of their telecommunications networks. Australia, Japan and New Zealand have all banned Huawei technology, in some cases taking even more aggressive actions than the United States.

      China is an existential threat to the West. Those who are far closer to China know that. London is about to find out the hard way, as is Germany.

      No, the US indeed has no right to military dominance over the South China Sea, but ask those who live in those areas which they’d rather have. Taiwan has made its position clear, as has South Korea and Japan. Hong Kong would lease itself back to England if it could.

      • I believe you should research PNTR, Permanent Normal Trade Relations, introduced by POTUS Bill Clinton in 2000. Voted on and passed by a Republican-controlled CONgress in May 2000 timeframe.

        PNTR eliminated tariffs and import restrictions on Chinese goods. Entire USA factories would close and move their machinery to the Peoples Republic of China.

        Today, almost everything one purchases is “Made in China”. Vitamins, pharmaceuticals, clothing and 35% of our foodstuffs are now made in Communist China. You can thank the sedition and treason of both Clinton and the 106th CONgress for undermining and ultimately destroying the sovereignty of the former USA.

    • That’s one argument for tariffs. They act as a block against government-subsidized competition providing cheaper products until all remnants of manufacturing capability have disappeared. The anarchist theory is that once the subsidy ends, the competition will immediately appear, but that’s a theoretical argument. Chip-burning facilities probably have a considerable lead time.

      Anyway, the tradeoff is, with tariffs, your manufactured items are more expensive, no doubt, but the number of domestic jobs, and their quality, goes up, community dislocation goes down with higher employment, and the quality of life stays high or goes high. The downside is certain segments, unavoidably, are hurt by tariffs, and they create a concentrated squawk.

      So, tariffs and immigration barriers do create benefits, but the politicians and citizens have to be intelligent enough and foresightful enough to see them through.

      • RonaldB,

        I believe the politicians need to be Patriots and believe in the citizens of this nation they purport to serve. Instead, they are self-serving and the fools of the American electorate have kept the traitors in power !

Comments are closed.