A Dragon Emerges: Has China Arrived? - Updated

One of the reasons I created this blog was so that I can accumulate in one place the various sources I come across, read, and retain as I conduct my research. My intention behind Information Dissemination was to gather the random bits of relevant data usually scatted to the ends of the internet so information can be retained, and recovered later if necessary, as events develop. In some discussions, I fall well short of leaving a reader informed, although on others I think one can read the links contained in a single entry and be in the top 1% of the subject matter.

It is one of the primary reasons my posts are usually sourced with multiple links in an effort to insure the reader can readily access information usually hidden deep inside the web. Sometimes I read an article that does it better than I ever could.

Air Force Magazine online has a must read article on China called "China Stands Up." It is one of the most concise, to the point summaries of the steady maturation of the PLA you will find anywhere.

Sun Tzu would be pleased. Some 2,500 years ago, the great Chinese strategist wrote: “The art of war is of vital importance to the state.” Today, communist China, with a rapidly if unevenly expanding economy, has turned to building a world-class military force and mastering the art of modern war, all part of its quest to become the predominant power in Asia.

The country’s very name—“Chung Kuo”—means the “Middle Kingdom,” a concept holding that China is superior to all other nations. That principle endured even as Mongols, Manchus, and Westerners successively overran China. More than 40 years ago, John King Fairbank, among the most prominent scholars of modern China studies in the United States, foresaw the emergence of a new Middle Kingdom. China’s communist rulers, he said, “are the heirs of the imperial tradition of the Middle Kingdom.”

Read the entire thing, you will not be disappointed. The links below are most of the sources cited in the article for those who wish to know what all who are concerned over China's military should know.

China's National Defense in 2006
issued by the Information Office of the State Council
People's Republic of China
December 29, 2024

More on the First Island Strategy
Air War beyond the First Island Chain:
Implications of China’s Military Modernization for U.S. Maritime Strategy
by David Little, LCDR USN

2007 Report to Congress of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission
June 1, 2024

Annual Report to Congress
Military Power of the People’s Republic of China 2007
Office of the Secretary of Defense

A Chinese Military Superpower?
John J. Tkacik, Jr.
Senior Research Fellow, Asian Studies Center
The Heritage Foundation March 8, 2024

China's Quest for a Superpower Military
John J. Tkacik, Jr.
Senior Research Fellow, Asian Studies Center
The Heritage Foundation May 17, 2024

The AF Magazine article ends "The US holds a definitive military advantage over China in the near term. But one cannot rule out new Chinese assertiveness or old regional tensions leading to a military miscalculation, involving a rising power, in a region packed with US allies and interests." Indeed.

H/T: rickusn

Update: Eagle1 and I must of read the same memo, a Maritime Conspiracy no doubt. He outlines the larger strategic analysis with insightful maps that illustrate the "dilemma" facing the United States.