Look at it from Xi Jinping’s perspective.  The PRC’s leader-for-life learned nothing from Joe Biden’s abject surrender in Afghanistan but confirmed everything that he knows about our 46th president.  Xi’s knowledge of Biden is bound to lead him to conclude -- if he hasn’t already -- that his window for conquest is during Biden’s tenure.  Weakness -- in Biden’s case, evident gross weakness -- invites predation.  It’s a law of nature and human affairs.      

By conquest, we’re not referring to anything as dramatic as an attack on the U.S.  To achieve PRC dominance, Xi would hope to avoid direct conflict with America.  War’s definition has expanded, anyway; it’s increasingly asymmetric, multidimensional. 

“Battlefields” include areas of perceptions manipulation, cultural subversion, infiltration, leveraging commerce, neutralizing or corrupting an adversary’s elites, financially and otherwise.  It’s possible to fight and win wars without a shot being fired.  The PRC has been conducting unconventional war against the U.S. for years now.  Uncle Sam has been slow on the uptake.           

For Xi, conquest doesn’t refer solely to the PRC’s longstanding desire to capture Taiwan.  That’s a first objective.  Or control of the South China Sea.  That’s international waters and vital to U.S., allied, and global commerce.  It’s the subject of creeping conquest by China. 

No, here we refer to the PRC’s longer-term aim: global hegemony.  China’s dragon, not Uncle Sam, is to bestride the world.  Pax Americana is to be replaced by East Germany with a Chinese face.  If you don’t think that matters to Des Moines and San Jose and Little Rock, think again. 

If you worry about the Democrats' embrace of COVID tyranny; the 2020 presidential elections fix; the clearly unconstitutional dictum from Biden about forced vaccinations; the dissolved U.S.-Mexican border; the imposition of Critical Race Theory; and pernicious cancel culture -- then be very worried if China topples the U.S. globally. 

A globally dominant China means that Xi and his successors (Xi is 68 years old) will order the community of nations as China is ordered: top-down.  That’s what a Leninist party does.  Obedience -- actually, subservience -- will be demanded.  Dissenting nations should expect rough treatment.  Ask Australians about that.  Ask Hongkongers about what happens when people stand up for liberty and rights.  Speak with Tibetans, Uyghurs, and Falun Gong practitioners about how they’re faring at Xi’s hands.  Ask the Taiwanese about the 24/7 menace they endure from the PRC.  

A triumphant PRC will, of necessity, export its tyranny.  The PRC won’t just control affairs among nations but within them.  “Progressives” and would-be oligarchs in the West are infatuated with China’s emerging totalitarian model, the “social credit system,” which is 1984 with a lot of scary high-tech applications. 

Like Murder Hornets, the social credit system has already invaded the U.S.  It just hasn’t yet spread its oversized wings across the nation.  Big Tech’s censorship is a leading indicator.  Chase Bank canceling Michel Flynn’s credit cards is illustrative (Chase restored Flynn’s cards after an outcry).  Masking is about compliance, not public health.  Biden’s vax passport endorsement is a further run at eviscerating our rights and controlling us. 

Granted, there’s nothing new about tyrants wanting to see someone’s papers.  The Nazis and Soviets demanded papers, but, today, add to the mix gobs of computer networked data on you, facial and retinal recognition, among other high-tech bells and whistles, and slipping through the state’s web will become nearly impossible.  Even Jack Reacher might have trouble evading this new Big Brother.    

Xi taking Biden’s measure isn’t hard to do.  It predates the Afghanistan disaster.  He’s also sized up Biden’s weak top echelon: notably, Tony Blinken at State, Lloyd Austin at Defense, and General Mark Milley.  It would be interesting to know the depth of Xi’s contempt for these men.          

Biden’s corruption is well known to Xi.  If we accept the emails that Tony Bobulinski provided Tucker Carlson before last year’s elections -- and there’s no reason not to -- Biden is a historically compromised president.  Per the emails, the “Big Guy” received a 10% skim of Hunter Biden’s takings from China, Russia, Ukraine, and elsewhere.  The PRC’s dossier of incriminating evidence on the “Biden Family Syndicate’s” influence-peddling schemes is surely thick.      

The million-dollar questions: To what extent does Biden’s corruption impede his discharge of duties?  Is there a red line that Biden dare not cross with the PRC?        

In his early dealings with China, Biden and his minions have sent mixed signals.  Ambiguity can be effective in dealing with an adversary -- if it’s the right sort of ambiguity.  But Xi isn’t seeing useful ambiguity from Biden; he’s seeing abysmal decision making, incompetence, callous disregard, and lack of resolve.  Biden is also feeble, which is no small consideration.        

Antony Blinken was outright humiliated by two high-ranking Chinese officials at the now-infamous meeting at Anchorage, Alaska back in March.  Blinken’s presentation of China’s human rights violations was tepid and his smackdown by the two high-ranking PRC officials celebrated in China.

Then this Epoch Times, September 17 headline says it all: “Blinken Replaces ‘We Stand With the People of Hong Kong’ With a Milder version on Twitter.”

In diplomacy, like law, language matters.  Blinken removing a statement of American solidarity with Hongkongers is consequential.  Blinken slunk behind a red line. 

What about the “wokeness” that Lloyd Austin is pushing on the military?  What is Xi concluding, that the U.S. is preparing future warriors for conflict with the PRC or for life on military bases comparable to the rotted “progressive” cultures on American college campuses?  

Then there’s the recent explosive Bob Woodward revelation that Mark Milley decided to play junta chief and assure his PRC counterpart, General Li Zuocheng, that he, not Trump, had control of the U.S. military following the 2020 elections.  What conclusion is Xi drawing from Milley’s treachery?    

1945 reported on September 17 that the U.S., U.K., and Australia have formed an alliance (AUKUS), defensive in nature.  On the face of it, that’s good news.  Australia, with U.S. assistance, will be able to build and operate its own nuclear-powered submarines, this as an unstated counter to the PRC.

But 1945 further reports that “the Biden administration insists the deal is a ‘one off’ without potential extension or duplication to additional partners.”  Here, the Biden administration would have been better served by ambiguity.  Why signal Xi that further moves are off the table?  In fact, why are additional moves out-of-bounds?              

Here’s the critical takeaway for Xi: Biden’s pattern in the early going demonstrates a lack of will to contend with and prevail against a rising enemy.  Military prowess, technological edges, and alliances are for naught without leadership resolve generally and a focused and declared determination to confront and counter challenges from the PRC and other adversaries.        

Along with Marx, Xi will have read Sun Tzu.  He appreciates this Sun Tzu aphorism, no doubt: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.”

The offset to Biden’s weakness is for a huge grassroots mobilization that permits the GOP to retake Congress in 2022 (demanding honest elections is first order).  Xi may not fear Joe Biden, but he must fear a fiercely resolved American citizenry. 

 J. Robert Smith can be found regularly at Gab @JRobertSmith and occasionally on Parler, again @JRobertSmith.  He also blogs at Flyover.

Image: Presidencia de la República Mexicana

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