Pursuing Geopolitical Advantage? 

China’s Search for Military Allies

LtCol Gary J. Sampson, USMC

China’s leaders apparently see their partnership-focused foreign policy

strategy as adequate, but that view may not hold indefinitely. Strategic 

competition with the United States and its allies, even now, is beginning 

to expose the limitations of Beijing’s partnerships. If, as many theorize,

China were to attack Taiwan, would it not be best prepared for 

success by seeking military alliances beyond its sole current ally,

North Korea? This Research Short provides theory-driven indicators to 

raise awareness among decisionmakers in Washington and elsewhere 

about the conditions that could lead China to seek new military allies—

for military adventurism focused on Taiwan, or something else.

Understanding these alliance formation conditions offers opportunities

to counter China’s efforts to expand its hard power.

RESEARCH SHORT

November 14, 2023

What this is:

This report is the result of 

academic research. As the IC’s 

university, NIU is uniquely 

positioned to use academic 

approaches to research—and 

report on—subjects of interest 

to the community.

What this is not:

This is not finished intelligence. 

The opinions expressed are 

solely those of the author’s and 

not those of the National 

Intelligence University or any 

other U.S. Government agency.

IMAGE FROM SHUTTERSTOCK

INSIGHT Sharing academic research
2

Why China and Alliances? 

As China’s strategic competition with the United States 

intensifies—just one among many potential reasons for 

Beijing to seek alliances—China has yet to forge additional 

traditional military alliances beyond its single formal military 

ally, North Korea. If, as many observers surmise, China is 

preparing to attack Taiwan within the next decade, why has 

it done so little to secure alliances with other countries? What 

might such efforts look like? 

Until now, China has instead relied on many suballiance

partnerships of various designs. Although these relationships

have addressed China’s primarily economic wants and needs, 

such bonds may not be enough during war. Academic 

literature suggests alliances are vital in warfare; for example, 

the “bar fight theory of international conflict” asserts that 

regime type is crucial to wartime coalition formation, noting 

that democracies fight in larger coalitions and so tend to win 

more wars.1 The “specificity, legal and moral obligation, and 

reciprocity that are usually lacking in informal alignments”2

make a military alliance the most effective and reliable means of multilateral security 

cooperation.3

 Additional drivers of alliance formation include security concerns,4 emotion and 

empathy,5

 identity and status,6 and the desire to control other states7 and critical resources.8

The United States and its allies must consider the possibility that China could shift from its

partnership-focused approach to strategic competition and instead pursue more traditional

military alliances that could bolster China’s war-waging capacity, cleave away wavering U.S. 

partners, and secure Beijing’s access to necessary resources. This Research Short makes the 

case that China may abandon its nonalliance policy, posing the question: Under what 

conditions will Beijing pursue new formal security alliances?9

China’s Shifting Policies Portend Growing Openness to Alliances

Recent changes in China’s longstanding foreign policy positions are logical given its goals 

to become “the preeminent power in East Asia and a major power on the world stage”10 and 

to bolster its security.

11 Beijing’s shifting stance on overseas basing of military troops is a 

key example. China’s 2013 Defense White Paper “For the first time ever... explicitly 

expressed that the country’s military forces are expected to protect its overseas interests.”12

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy’s April 2023 evacuation of more than 1,000 

Chinese citizens from strife-riven Sudan 13 showcased the burgeoning power-projection 

capabilities of what has become the world’s largest navy and the operational payoff of having 

military forces routinely deployed abroad in places such as Djibouti. The PLA facility there 

KEY RESEARCH INSIGHTS

• U.S. and IC decisionmakers should remain 

cognizant of the gains China could obtain 

from pursuing a limited alliance formation 

strategy.

• Domestic U.S. politics might inadvertently 

open the field to China and others to begin 

alliance formation—potentially targeting 

wavering current U.S. alliance partners such 

as Thailand or the Philippines.

• China is unlikely to seek alliance parity with 

the United States, but picking off waverers 

among current American allies or key 

middle-power hedgers in the region— 

such as Singapore, Vietnam, or Indonesia—

might swing geopolitical momentum into 

China's court.
3

has the capacity for “a wide range of PLA operations well beyond logistical support,”14 as 

well as competition with the United States.15

Such a momentous shift in People’s Republic of China (PRC) foreign 

policy raises the likelihood that, with a greatly empowered and more 

assertive top leader in Xi Jinping, others could be in the offing—

including a different way of thinking about traditional security alliances.

Although China’s history of nonalignment and stated views of military 

alliances as “Cold War thinking” suggest ongoing concern about becoming entangled in other’s 

conflicts, 16, 17 Beijing may increasingly see that risk as manageable.

18 Indeed, China has 

recently pushed its Global Security Initiative (GSI), another suballiance effort to gain alliancelike benefits, explicitly in the security realm. First proposed by Xi in 2022,

19 the GSI was 

recently described by former Defense Minister Li Shangfu as an alternative to the U.S. alliance 

system and “a new path to security.” Although Li also said the GSI prizes “partnership over 

alliances,”20 it does not disadvantage China to pursue partnerships today while preparing for 

alliances when the conditions are right.

Five Candidate Alliance Formation Conditions for China

The alliance formation literature, plus China-specific factors (see box), point to at least five

conditions under which Beijing is likely to seek formal defense agreements with other 

countries. First and foremost, the candidate ally must be in a geographic location that allows 

a realistic projection of Chinese military power.

21, 22 Wael Abbas and Zoltan Schneider’s 

research identifies geographic proximity as the “significant variable for alliance formation.”23

Second, and related to the first condition, a security threat directed toward China’s border

(land or maritime) must be addressed by allying with the candidate state; this concern drove

China’s intervention in the Korean War. Further, an alignment of security interests must exist 

for both states. For example, Chinese studies of Sino-Russian relations show that significantly 

diverging security interests create a barrier to alliance for these “no-limits” partners.

24 Western 

academics, as B. K. Yoder notes, agree that an alliance is not likely, but we should expect the 

partnership to be durable.25

Third, China must share ideological or autocratic alignment with the candidate ally. China 

will not want any new allies critiquing how Beijing runs its domestic business and probably 

will require them to agree at least tacitly to conform to Chinese views of hierarchy (see box).

Although China would almost certainly form partnerships based on “the enemy of my enemy 

is my friend” logic that pushed Beijing and Washington together against Moscow in the late 

1960s and early 1970s, the entente was discarded almost as soon as the Soviet Union collapsed. 

The United States has attempted to downplay the role of ideology in the current strategic 

competition, differentiating it from the U.S.-Soviet Cold War, and China has similarly talked

derisively about the formation of blocs as redolent of a “Cold War mentality.” Certain states, 

including North Korea, Russia, Iran, and Turkey, however, tend to share opposition to many

– Quansheng Zhao

Interpreting Chinese 

Foreign Policy

“Ideas serve as roadmaps.”
4

aims and efforts of the United States and its Western partners

(i.e., the consonance in regime type or ideology that fuels

alliances). China, therefore, is likely to find the most fertile 

ground for further solidifying relations with this cohort, up to 

and including military alliance—and, with North Korea,

further institutionalization of alliance ties.

Fourth, Beijing must operate within a strategic environment 

where lesser forms of partnership, such as cooperation or 

alignment, are insufficient to achieve China’s ends.

30 As 

Zhen Han and Mihaela Papa wrote in 2021, based on a metaanalysis of Chinese writings on alliances and partnerships, 

“The alliance concept is not obsolete in Chinese IR, and 

alliance formation could intensify if China’s external threats 

become more formidable.”31 As U.S.-China security tension

intensifies in the coming years, this condition may be met, 

opening the possibility of alliances for China, just as overseas 

basing was once thought beyond the pale.32 Among the five 

conditions proposed, this may be the hardest to observe 

empirically, but recent U.S.-China duels over enhancing 

diplomatic ties, e.g., in the Pacific Island countries, may 

provide indicators. A fresh instance of checkbook diplomacy 

is underway, with embassy and consulate facilities under 

development, among other efforts to signal commitment and 

interest. Might a new defense pact be the fait accompli that 

puts one competitor decisively on top?

Fifth, China’s challenge of having sufficient resources, such 

as potable drinking water and agricultural products, to keep 

its large population fed and their minds away from revolt 

makes securing access to select resources an alliance 

formation factor.33 Beijing has acquired overseas farmland 

and created a strategic reserve of foodstuffs that the U.S. 

Department of Agriculture estimates holds one-half of global 

wheat reserves; a state-controlled Chinese newspaper adds

that the PRC’s stockpiles of rice and wheat are sufficient to 

keep the Chinese people fed for as long as 18 months.34

China also relies heavily on imported petroleum, which accounts for 70 percent of its daily use,

and “is the biggest importer of every industrial commodity,”35 so its vulnerability to loss of 

supply—most of which comes by sea—is particularly acute. China can better and more easily 

obtain these goods via trade, but any military adventurism targeting Taiwan is likely to trigger

economic sanctions of the sort Moscow experienced after its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. “The 

longer a conflict lasts,” historian Margaret MacMillan writes, “the more important allies and 

CHINA-SPECIFIC FACTORS

In addition to the academic literature on 

alliance formation, which is primarily derived 

from the experiences of European and other 

Western states, key factors particular to China 

also inform its alliance formation conditions, 

as follows:

Confucianism and Chinese Socialism:26

Hierarchical concepts define an individual’s 

obligations within society and subordination to 

the collective; as seen in Xi’s global initiatives, 

such as the GSI, Global Development Initiative, 

and Global Civilization Initiative.

Legacy of Tribute System:27 Traditional view of 

dynastic China as the center of the world and 

the Chinese leader as authoritative over “all 

under heaven.”

Major Power Exceptionalism/Great Power 

Chauvinism: Beijing today expects to be the 

primary actor in any future alliance, in contrast 

to its junior partner status in its early Cold War 

alliance with the Soviet Union.

Preference for Orderly Environment, Against 

Chaos:28 Beijing’s slow and steady influence 

campaigns, using all aspects of national power, 

seek to avoid outright conflict that detracts 

from progress.

Relational Security/Guanxi: Based on a 

calculus of certainty and stability in reciprocal 

relationships, China is “inclined to stress 

nonapparent national interests rather than 

apparent ones, thus transcending purely 

individualist rationality.”29
5

resources become.”36 Unless Beijing is supremely confident that its war of choice over Taiwan 

would be “short and sharp”37—about which states are consistently and notoriously wrong38—

choosing allies to help ameliorate this area of weakness would be an astute move for China.

China’s Most Plausible Military Allies

One method of narrowing down the list of prospective allies from the dozens of countries with 

which China maintains various types of partnerships is to start with Han and Papa’s list of 

China’s 10 closest partners: Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, 

Afghanistan, Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. These states are required by 

agreement not to “join any alliances that threaten the sovereignty, security, and territorial 

integrity of signed partners,” 39 essentially giving China a veto over their potential future 

alliance formation behavior. Han and Papa’s inclusion of Ukraine predates Russia’s invasion, 

and whether China could block a potential Ukrainian move to join NATO is open to question. 

Table: Summary of Conditional Analysis

Potential Ally 

Country (listed 

alphabetically)

Geographic 

Proximity or 

Realistic Power 

Projection

Addresses Threat 

to PRC Border or 

Shared Security 

Interests

Ideological/ 

Autocratic 

Alignment 

(~regime type)

Lesser Forms of 

Partnership 

Inadequate To 

Achieve PRC’s Aims

Securing Access 

to Resources

Afghanistan X + copper, lithium

Cambodia X - + Yes? + fresh water?

Cuba + Yes

Djibouti X - No

Iran X - + + petroleum

Kazakhstan X -

Kyrgyzstan X +

Mongolia X +

Myanmar X + + Yes? + foodstuffs

Pakistan X + + No

Russia X - ++ No + petroleum,

technology (e.g., 

semiconductors)

Sri Lanka X -

Tajikistan X +

Thailand X - +

Turkey - +

Turkmenistan X -

Ukraine - + foodstuffs

Uzbekistan X -

Bold = the most likely alliance partners for China, based on the conditional analysis (~Top 5)

X = most significant baseline requirement condition present

- negatively-trending condition

+ positively trending condition (the more +, the more positive)

? = soft yes

Blank space = the condition does not apply to the candidate country or more information is needed to make this judgment
6

Based on geopolitical analysis and China’s observed alliance-correlated agenda40—such as 

serving economic or regime legitimacy interests or offering overseas bases—to these can be

added: Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Iran, Djibouti, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Cuba. For quick 

comparison, the table provides a snapshot of which of the five identified conditions apply to 

each of China’s most plausible 18 candidate ally countries. (See Table; for a map and more 

details on these countries’ ties to China, please see the Appendix.)

Implications for the United States and the IC

Although China’s alliance behavior has limited empirical data, theory-driven and culturally 

informed inferences about how its growth could progress may allow U.S. decisionmakers to 

be one step ahead of China—or, at the very least, to not be caught flat-footed when China 

begins to make alliance-related moves. Primary drivers of China’s prospective move toward 

alliances could include failure of its partnership strategy, particularly the Belt and Road 

Initiative, or an abrupt economic crisis that drives its leaders to look to other aspects of national 

power to achieve their ends, such as military capabilities. External triggers might be defections 

from the traditional U.S. ally camp in Asia, such as the Philippines or Thailand, or another

Southeast Asian middle power that has been sitting on the pivot point between China and the 

United States decisively siding with Beijing.

This Research Short has purposely analyzed what China wants from new alliances, but these 

drivers suggest that future IC assessments should also weigh what those prospective alliance 

members would get from such agreements. Ranging from the extractive—akin to “protection 

money”—to more collaborative arrangements, such IC inquiry and analysis could inform

alternatives that policymakers develop to help countries resist being drawn into China’s orbit.

National security analyst Josh Rogin has noted the “minilateralism” of U.S. defense treaty 

allies—including Australia and Japan—banding together for enhanced security cooperation,

41

but the key indicator of U.S. success in developing a balancing coalition against China probably

will be the prospective inclusion of nonallied middle powers in the region, such as Vietnam, 

Indonesia, or Singapore. As Andrew O’Neil concluded in 2018, challenging China over 

disputed South China Sea territories carries “the potential to trigger escalation to armed conflict 

in the region,”42 and joining a strategic-competition coalition against China may hold the same 

dangers for these countries. The Pacific Island nations are vulnerable to a lesser extent, which 

probably led the Solomon Islands to cast its lot with China in last year’s security agreement; 

while it is not a defense treaty, this agreement probably opens the door to a Chinese military 

presence.43 Many other countries in the region chose to lean toward Washington in the 2022 

Declaration on a 21st Century U.S.-Pacific Island Partnership that included U.S. pledges of 

more than $800 million for developmental programs spanning climate change, infrastructure, 

education, security, and public health.44

In return, these countries offer what the U.S. military refers to as access, basing, and overflight 

(ABO)—valuable assets in the unfolding U.S.-China strategic competition that become 
7

invaluable should conflict ensue. But Southeast Asia’s middle powers, currently sitting at the 

pivot point between the United States and China, offer much more than ABO. Indonesia and 

Vietnam, for example, are rich in natural resources, and Singapore offers financial assets. 

Above all, these countries are located in prized strategic locations. Singapore sits astride a 

principal global sea line of communication between the South China Sea and Strait of Malacca, 

while Indonesia is the archipelagic overseer of any plausible maritime alternative to the 

Malacca Strait between the Strait of Hormuz/Suez Canal and China’s maritime frontier. Many 

Southeast Asian states are on the record about not wanting to choose between the United States 

and China,

45 but in the end, such a choice may be forced upon them.

To restate a truism that remains applicable here, the past is not the future. For China to seize 

upon the opportunities presented by “great changes unseen in a century,”46 Beijing may need 

a new operating system for its external relations—one no longer constrained by the shackles 

that bound it when it was a weak or a middle power. Alliance networks are not solely a Western 

tool; for the first time since the 1960s, they could become a sanctioned component of Chinese 

statecraft, offering value for China and like-minded countries. 47 From the U.S. alliance 

experience after the Second World War, China has observed that alliance networks can help 

contain the ambitions of other states, as NATO did against the Soviet Union. Despite the 

possibility of becoming entangled with allies, allied and partner nation ABO can help enable 

global power protection and global reach. China now needs to protect its global interests, and 

its large, globally deployable navy can be a powerful tool for both coercion and for partnership. 

With all this in mind, it is plausible that alliances can be a part of Xi’s China dream—part of 

China’s rejuvenation.

48

This Research Short is part of the NIU Office of Research’s “Year of China” initiative.

LtCol Gary Sampson is Northeast Asia Desk Officer in the International Affairs Branch, U.S. Marine 

Corps Headquarters at the Pentagon, and a 2015 graduate of National Intelligence University, where 

he recently served as a research fellow in NIU’s Caracristi Institute for Intelligence Research. A career 

intelligence officer and, since 2012, a Northeast Asia (China) Foreign Area Officer, he is also a Public 

Intellectuals Program Fellow with the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. LtCol Sampson is a 

Ph.D. candidate in international relations at Tufts University’s Fletcher School, where his dissertation 

research focuses on PRC-North Korea relations after 1991. He also was an Olmsted Foundation Scholar 

at National Sun Yat-sen University, Taiwan.

If you have comments, questions, or suggestions for a Research Short topic or article, please contact 

the NIU Office of Research at NIU_OOR@dodiis.mil.
8

Appendix: Likely Military Allies Based on China’s Conditions

This study of China’s prospective alliance formation conditions has yielded 18 candidate ally 

countries (see map), each of which fulfills some, though not all, of these conditions: provides 

geographic proximity or power projection opportunity; shares security interests or addresses a 

threat to China’s border; aligns ideologically/fellow autocracy; replaces a lesser partnership 

that no longer meets China’s goals; or secures access to resources. These countries include 

China’s 10 closest partners, as identified by Zhen Han and Mihaela Papa: Pakistan, 

Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, 

and Tajikistan.

49

Added to these are eight countries that bear a closer look because they meet at least one of the 

identified conditions: Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Iran, Djibouti, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and 

Cuba. The first three countries have moved closer to China under authoritarian rule or militarybacked governments. Thailand, however, is unique in this group because Washington and 

Bangkok remain defense treaty allies despite repeated military coups.

50 Iran has also grown 

increasingly reliant on China as Tehran faces diplomatic isolation and a struggling economy.51

Djibouti is notable as the location of China’s first overseas military base, showcasing its 

geostrategic importance to Beijing by providing a prospective launching point for humanitarian 

assistance operations, multinational peacekeeping efforts in Africa, and antipiracy task force 

missions in the Indian Ocean52—illustrating the two countries’ complementary economic and 

security goals.53 A potential Chinese foothold on the other side of the Indian Ocean from East 

Africa is Sri Lanka, one of the more heavily infiltrated locations of China’s Belt and Road 
9

Initiative efforts.54 Turkey, a NATO member, stakes out an independent foreign policy that 

tacks between closeness to Europe and to China, which is Ankara’s top source of imports.

55

And Cuba made the list powered by June 2023 media reports of Chinese intelligence bases and 

possibly combined military training,

56 not to mention Havana’s communistic solidarity.

Five of the 18 candidate countries are deemed to be China’s most likely alliance partners—

Cambodia, Iran, Myanmar, Pakistan, and Russia—based on, most importantly, their proximity 

to China and, since this research focuses on prospective defense pacts, the realistic prospect of 

Beijing deploying its military power to these countries. For example, Cambodia hosts new 

naval construction and may soon host PLA Navy assets,

57 and Pakistan has long been a close 

military partner of China.58 All these countries also possess resources that Beijing needs, and 

an alliance could provide a more durable means of guaranteeing the continued flow of such 

staples to China. All five are autocratic regimes, shared with the Chinese Communist Party’s 

rule of China. About half of these countries, as Beijing’s allies, would bolster China’s border 

security or they reasonably share a similar threat outlook. In total, these five countries rated the 

highest across the alliance formation conditions examined in this work. Other scholars, such 

as Isaac Kardon, assert the group of potential military allies is smaller. Using major conflict as 

the driver that would move a security relationship with China to a de facto alliance, Kardon

counts just two prospective allies—Pakistan and Cambodia—in addition to China’s current

sole ally, North Korea.59
10

Endnotes

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39, https://doi.org/10.1017/psrm.2015.52.

2 Glenn H. Snyder, Alliance Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997), 8.

3 Evan N. Resnick and Hannah Elyse Sworn, “China and the Alliance Allergy of Rising Powers,” War on the Rocks, 

May 30, 2023, https://warontherocks.com/2023/05/china-and-the-alliance-allergy-of-rising-powers/.

4 Robert Jervis, “Cooperation Under the Security Dilemma,” World Politics 30, no. 2 (1978): 189, https://doi.org/

10.2307/2009958; Stephen M. Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990).

5 Feng Zhu, “Flawed Mediation and a Compelling Mission: Chinese Diplomacy in the Six-Party Talks to 

Denuclearise North Korea.” East Asia 28, no. 3 (2011): 191-218 (especially page 213).

6 Hochul Lee, “China in the North Korean Nuclear Crises: ‘Interest’ and ‘Identity’ in Foreign Behavior,” Journal of 

Contemporary China 22, no. 80 (February 1, 2013): 312-31, https://doi.org/10.1080/10670564.2012.734085; 

Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, “Taking Stock: The Constructivist Research Program in International 

Relations and Comparative Politics,” Annual Review of Political Science 4 (2001): 392, 

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International Security 27, no. 4 (2003): 56, https://doi.org/10.1162/016228803321951081.

7 Paul W. Schroeder, “Alliances, 1815-1945: Weapons of Power and Tools of Management,” in Historical Dimensions 

of National Security Problems, ed. Klaus Knorr (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1976), 227-62.

8 Michael T. Klare, “The New Geography of Conflict.” Foreign Affairs 80, no. 3 (May 1, 2001): 49-61, 

https://doi.org/10.2307/20050150.

9 Zhen Han and Mihaela Papa, “Alliances in Chinese International Relations: Are They Ending or Rejuvenating?” 

Asian Security 17 (May 4, 2021): 172, https://doi.org/10.1080/14799855.2020.1825380. (Han and Papa suggest a 

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10 Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community,

February 6, 2023: 6, https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ATA-2023-Unclassified-Report.pdf.

11 Avery Goldstein, “China’s Grand Strategy Under Xi Jinping: Reassurance, Reform, and Resistance,” International 

Security 45, no. 1 (June 1, 2020): 164-201, https://doi.org/10.1162/isec_a_00383.

12 Minjiang Li, Kaylan M. Kemburi, and Zhang Hongzhou, “Growth of China’s Power: Capabilities, Perceptions, and 

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13 Center for Naval Analyses, “PLAN Supports Evacuation of PRC and Foreign Citizens from Sudan,” PLA Update 

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14 Peter Dutton, Isaac Kardon, and Conor Kennedy, “China Maritime Report No. 6: Djibouti: China’s First Overseas 

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15 Carmody Padraig and Ian Taylor, “Chinese Interests and Strategies in Africa,” in The New Scramble for Africa, ed. 

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16 Joe McDonald, “China Accuses US of ‘Cold War Thinking’ in Security Strategy,” AP News, October 13, 2022, 

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-biden-technology-united-states-china-19fda5bc4e4b0e87bfb982

cac4250695; Aixin Li, Yuandan Guo, and Qingqing Chen, “Chinese Defense Minister Begins Singapore 

Visit by Enhancing ASEAN-China Defense Cooperation,” Global Times in English, June 1, 2023, 

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202306/1291796.shtml.

17 Xuetong Yan, Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019), 65.

18 Michael Beckley, “The Myth of Entangling Alliances: Reassessing the Security Risks of U.S. Defense Pacts,” 

International Security 39, no. 4 (April 1, 2015): 47, https://doi.org/10.1162/ISEC_a_00197.

19 Carla P. Freeman and Alex Stephenson, “Xi Kicks Off Campaign for a Chinese Vision of Global Security,” United 

States Institute of Peace, October 5, 2022, https://www.usip.org/publications/2022/10/xi-kicks-campaign-chinese-
11

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20 Li Shangfu, “Remarks at the Fifth Plenary Session, 20th Asia Security Summit, the Shangri-La Dialogue,” 20th 

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22 John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: Norton, 2001).

23 Wael Abbas and Zoltan Schneider, “Understanding Alliance Formation Patterns,” U.S. Naval Postgraduate School 

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24 Han and Papa, “Alliances in Chinese International Relations,” 167.

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27 Huang and Shi, Harmonious Intervention, 12-13.

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29 Huang and Shi, Harmonious Intervention, 18.

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31 Han and Papa, “Alliances in Chinese International Relations,” 171.

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33 Peter Zeihan, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization (New York: 

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34 Nicole Hong, “Extreme Floods and Heat in China Ravage Farms and Kill Animals,” New York Times, June 24, 

2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/24/world/asia/extreme-weather-china-food.html.

35 Zeihan, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning, 353.

36 Margaret MacMillan, “How Wars Don’t End,” Foreign Affairs (June 12, 2023): 61, https://www.foreignaffairs

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37 James E. Fanell, “China’s National Sovereignty and the Tightening Noose Around the Senkaku Islands,” Testimony,

U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (April 13, 2017): 1, https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/

Fanell%20Testimony.pdf. (Retired U.S. Naval Intelligence Officer James Fanell was cashiered from his post as the U.S. 

Pacific Fleet’s senior intelligence officer after an early 2014 address in which he said China was preparing for a “short, 

sharp war” against Japanese-held islands in the East China Sea. The terminology then entered the lexicon referring to 

fait accompli-type military gambits prospectively to be used by Beijing. The author applies it here to Taiwan.)

38 MacMillan, “How Wars Don’t End,” 59.

39 Han and Papa, “Alliances in Chinese International Relations,” citing Lin, “Zhongguo Weishenme Bujiemeng [Why 

Is China Not Aligned]” (2013): 26. 

40 Cristina L. Garafola et al., The People’s Liberation Army’s Search for Overseas Basing and Access: A Framework 

to Assess Potential Host Nations, RR-A1496-2 (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2022); Scott D. Sagan, “Why Do 

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12

41 Josh Rogin, “Opinion | America’s Asian Allies Are Quietly Joining Forces To Confront China,” Washington Post,

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42 Andrew O’Neil, “The Future of Alliances in Asia,” in The Routledge Handbook of Asian Security Studies, 2nd ed., 

eds. Sumit Ganguly, Andrew Scobell, and Joseph Chinyong Liow (London: Routledge, 2018), 359.

43 Michael E. Miller and Frances Vinall, “China Signs Security Deal with Solomon Islands, Alarming Neighbors,” 

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44 U.S. White House, “Roadmap for a 21st-Century U.S.-Pacific Island Partnership,” White House Fact Sheet, 

September 29, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/09/29/fact-sheetroadmap-for-a-21st-century-u-s-pacific-island-partnership/.

45 Jonathan Stromseth, “Don’t Make Us Choose: Southeast Asia in the Throes of U.S.-China Rivalry,” The Brookings 

Institution, October 2019, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/don’t-make-us-choose-southeast-asia-in-the-throesof-us-china-rivalry.

46 Rush Doshi, “Beijing Believes Trump Is Accelerating American Decline,” Foreign Policy (blog), October 12, 2020, 

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/10/12/china-trump-accelerating-american-decline/; Mark Leonard, “China Is Ready for 

a World of Disorder: America Is Not,” Foreign Affairs (June 20, 2023): 116, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/unitedstates/china-ready-world-disorder.

47 Leonard, “China Is Ready for a World of Disorder,” page 117.

48 Elizabeth Economy, “Excerpt: The Third Revolution,” Council on Foreign Relations, 2018, https://www.cfr.org/

excerpt-third-revolution.

49 Han and Papa, “Alliances in Chinese International Relations,” 158-77.

50 U.S. Department of State, “U.S. Relations with Thailand,” Bilateral Relations Fact Sheet, Bureau of East Asian and 

Pacific Affairs, May 4, 2021, https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-thailand/; U.S. Congressional Research 

Service, “Thailand: Background and U.S. Relations,” June 17, 2020, everycrsreport.com/files/2020-06-

17_IF10253_756fc7f94d3cc35fa37eccf2fadb4e83361b026f.pdf.

51 Alex Yacoubian, Connor Bradbury, and Jordanna Yochai, “Iran’s Increasing Reliance on China,” The Iran Primer, 

United States Institute of Peace, September 11, 2019, https://iranprimer.usip.org/blog/2019/sep/11/irans-increasingreliance-china; Zeihan, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning, 353.

52 Curron, Kardon, and Kennedy, “China Maritme Report No. 6: Djibouti,” 1-39.

53 Erica Downs, Jeffrey Becker, and Patrick DeGategno, China’s Military Support Facility in Djibouti: The Economic 

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54 Meg Rithmire and Yihao Li, “Chinese Infrastructure Investments in Sri Lanka: A Pearl or Teardrop on the Belt and 

Road?,” Case Study, Harvard Business School, July 12, 2019; Jennifer Staats, “Where Does China’s Belt and Road 

Initiative Stand Six Years Later?” United States Institute of Peace, April 25, 2019, https://www.usip.org/index.php/

publications/2019/04/where-does-chinas-belt-and-road-initiative-stand-six-years-later.

55 Kali Robinson, “Turkey’s Growing Foreign Policy Ambitions,” Council on Foreign Relations Backgrounder, June 

1, 2021, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/turkeys-growing-foreign-policy-ambitions.

56 Warren P. Strobel et al., “Beijing Plans a New Training Facility in Cuba, Raising Prospect of Chinese Troops on 

America’s Doorstep,” Wall Street Journal, June 20, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/beijing-plans-a-newtraining-facility-in-cuba-raising-prospect-of-chinese-troops-on-americas-doorstep-e17fd5d1; Warren P. Strobel and 

Gordon Lubold, “Cuba To Host Secret Chinese Spy Base Focusing on U.S.,” Wall Street Journal, June 8, 2023, 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/cuba-to-host-secret-chinese-spy-base-focusing-on-u-s-b2fed0e0; Karoun Demirjian 

and Edward Wong, “China Has Had a Spy Base in Cuba for Years, U.S. Official Says,” New York Times, June 10, 

2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/10/us/politics/china-spy-base-cuba.html.

57 Ellen Nakashima and Cate Cadell, “China Secretly Building Naval Facility in Cambodia, Western Officials Say,” 

Washington Post, June 6, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/06/06/cambodia-chinanavy-base-ream/.

58 Sameer P. Lalwani, A Threshold Alliance: The China-Pakistan Military Relationship, United States Institute of 

Peace, no. 517 (March 2023), https://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/2023-03/sr-517_threshold-alliance-chinapakistan-military-relationship.pdf.

59 Isaac B. Kardon, “China’s Global Maritime Access: Alternatives to Overseas Military Bases in the Twenty-First 

Century,” Security Studies 31, no. 5 (October 27, 2022): 1-32, https://doi.org/10.1080/09636412.2022.2137429.