There is recognition by just about everyone in the West (and the democratic world) that China is a problem now and will be an ever growing one in the future. There is a big dilemma. They are the factory to the world and we all need their stuff. They can make it cheaper and faster than we can ourselves. They are a huge market, which every company wants to be in, SO, we can hardly cut them off. We can put some tariffs on their goods but its US that pays that not the Chinese – and besides they can just lower the price to cover that anyway.  So we are stuck with a “too big to fail” situation that there is little or no solution for. All the more reason to understand just what does China, or rather the Chinese ruling elite, want?

The best way to figure out is to do what the CIA has done for so many years in its “war games”. Put yourself in the shoes of the Chinese leadership and see how they would best get what they want. First, above all things the leadership wants to retain power and to do so will strike out (crush) at any threat to that power. That is true of most leaderships even in the democratic world. The only difference is the lengths one will go to stay in power. In the case of the Chinese we see how far from what they are doing in Hong Kong and with the repression of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang. Second, China wants to be respected again after years of being a backwater and being occupied by foreigners for the past few centuries. Pride is a powerful force. SO how to get that? And what would the next step be? By all we see the next step will be the reacquisition of Taiwan. It would be a huge feather in the cap of Chairman Xi – VERY visible and solidify his “greatness” in the eyes of the Chinese people.  SO we have to assume that taking Taiwan one way or another is on the cards AND it could be soon.

Thinking like the Chinese must be thinking the considerations are: 

1. The best option is to do what Hitler did in Czechoslovakia and Austria. Win without having to fight. Hitler actually thought he could do the same with Poland but miscalculated the response from England and France. To win Taiwan without a fight one has to weaken the resolve of the Taiwanese people to resist AND get the nations supporting Taiwan to acquiesce to the Chinese quest. 

2.  The best way to win without a fight is to have enough military power to make the thought of war extremely unpleasant. That is what Chamberlain was thinking when he gave Czechoslovakia away.  Hence, the large military buildup of China has been the result. If the Chinese military might is great enough will the USA really come to Taiwan’s aid? Once the answer becomes NO or probably not to the majority of voters in Taiwan, then the resolve to resist diminishes dramatically. The Taiwanese do not want a war with China as they would loose especially if the USA does not back them up.

So what is the best way to weaken Taiwan from within? Get the USA out of the picture. BUT – and this is most important – get the USA out of the picture WITHOUT damaging the business China gets from the USA (and the West). Chinese strategy must be to have your cake and eat it too.       

To best get the US out of the picture is to get the US to divert its attention to things other than Taiwan and China. Internal division within the USA would certainly do that. Therefore, thinking like the Chinese are obviously doing I would be willing to bet – even go so far as to announce as a fact – that the Chinese are actively involved in stirring up political divisions in the USA. It works not only to make their quest to take over Taiwan easier it also bursts the mystique of “democracy”. China does not like the idea of democracy as it is a direct threat to the power of the ruling regime.

So how would I go about stirring up political divisions in the USA and as a bonus weaken the idea of democracy as an attractive political option? Use the media WITHOUT the media even knowing you were doing it. The most effective media to do this is right wing media. The left wing might get riots in the streets of some cities but the right wing media actually got the mob to invade the Capitol Building. The extreme left might call for defunding the police but the extreme right called for hanging Mike Pence and killing dissenters. AND there are elements in the right wing that call for secession from the Union, speak about civil war – all perfect to divert America into dealing with problems at home and pay little attention to far away places most don’t know anything about (or care about) anyway.

The funny thing – actually the sad thing – is how easy it would be. That’s why I say it must be happening now. The Chinese are not stupid enough to miss the opportunity. In fact they don’t even have to funnel money into Fox “News”. All they have to do is funnel money into its new competitors like Newsmax. The more outrageous Newsmax is, the more audience it gets and the more Fox reacts by itself becoming more outrageous. The net effect is – without even knowing it – Hannity, Ingraham, Carlson, and most of the Fox pundits are working for the Chinese Communist Party. They are inadvertent, unwitting Chinese agents and have no idea they are so. We can say the same for much of social media as well.

Meanwhile, as we saw from the election of Trump, it is pretty easy to funnel money into organizations and hide where the money is really coming from. I saw the CIA do it in the Middle East when I lived there and my father was CIA. (We gave money to people and organizations that did not like the USA BUT they disliked the Russians even more – AND we made sure the recipient did not know it was the USA doing the funding as that would have hurt their credibility with their supporters). Now the game is even more sophisticated so it is virtually impossible to know who is really funding – if the funder wants to remain hidden.

The disturbing thing is that one can see this happening now. Flipping back and forth as I do from CNN, to Fox to MSNBC to Newsmax to BBC to France 21 etc it becomes obvious. There is a certain desperation that has descended on Fox as it is facing competitors it did not have for so long. Its pundits have been encouraged to become even more rabid in their attacks on the Government, the President and the Democrats etc. Others have woken up to its game – and its audience – and the Chinese have noticed. What’s worse, it is in their interests to take advantage of this. And they undoubtedly are.