China's Three-Phase Strategy to Displace American Global Order

Rush Doshi reveals China's decades-long grand strategy evolution from hiding capabilities to building regional order to pursuing global dominance.

Key Takeaways

• China's grand strategy evolved through three phases: blunting American power, building Chinese order, and expanding globally
• The 1989-1991 trifecta of Tiananmen, Gulf War, and Soviet collapse fundamentally reshaped China's threat perception of America
• China's strategy shifts are driven by assessments of the power gap between itself and the United States
• The 2008 financial crisis marked China's transition from asymmetric undermining to building alternative order structures
• Since 2016, China operates under "great changes unseen in a century," pursuing global technological and military dominance
• Chinese Communist Party documents provide surprisingly transparent roadmaps for understanding Beijing's long-term intentions
• China optimizes for market share and technological dominance rather than profit maximization in key industries
• The fourth industrial revolution represents an opportunity for China to achieve global leadership through technological supremacy
• A new bipartisan consensus on China competition has emerged in Washington despite broader political polarization

Timeline Overview

• 00:00–04:43 — Introduction: Rush Doshi's background as author of "The Long Game" and his influence on US-China policymaking circles during his time in the Biden administration
• 04:43–07:25 — Book Impact and Methodology: Discussion of how Doshi's analysis of Chinese primary sources created a five-million-word database revealing China's strategic evolution
• 07:25–11:00 — Doshi's Expertise and China Experience: His academic background, language skills, and year-long Fulbright experience studying at Hunan University in China
• 11:00–23:00 — Analytical Framework: Comparison to George Kennan's Soviet analysis and explanation of how Chinese Communist Party documents provide transparent strategic guidance
• 23:00–26:30 — Historical Roots: China's century of humiliation, nationalist origins, and why Chinese leaders have always benchmarked success against Western powers
• 26:30–30:19 — Phase One Strategy: Post-Cold War "blunting" approach under Deng Xiaoping focused on asymmetrically undermining American power without provoking backlash
• 30:19–33:37 — Phase Two Transition: How 2008 financial crisis changed Chinese perceptions of American decline, triggering shift to "building" Chinese order in Asia
• 33:37–39:14 — Strategic Comparisons: Historical parallels between America's reluctant rise to empire and China's expanding ambitions as power grows
• 39:14–42:55 — Nationalist Motivations: Analysis of why Chinese leaders want power, drawing parallels to postcolonial nationalism and psychological responses to humiliation
• 42:55–46:51 — US Policy Evolution: How the old engagement consensus collapsed and a new bipartisan China competition framework emerged despite Trump's transactional approach
• 46:51–50:46 — Technological Competition: China's focus on dominating the fourth industrial revolution through AI, quantum computing, and smart manufacturing
• 50:46–52:55 — Vision of Chinese Order: What Chinese global dominance would look like, including economic dependence, technological leadership, and authoritarian norm-setting

The Three Phases of Chinese Grand Strategy

• Rush Doshi identifies three distinct phases in China's post-Cold War grand strategy, each triggered by major shifts in Beijing's assessment of American power and the international balance of forces. These phases represent an evolution from defensive positioning to offensive expansion, culminating in today's global competition for technological and military supremacy.
• The first phase, "blunting," emerged from the traumatic trifecta of 1989-1991: the Tiananmen Square massacre that positioned America as an ideological threat, the Gulf War that demonstrated devastating American military capabilities against an army resembling China's own, and Soviet collapse that removed the strategic glue binding US-China cooperation while leaving America as the sole global superpower.
• Under Deng Xiaoping and his successor Jiang Zemin, China pursued a strategy of "hide capabilities and bide time" (tao guang yang hui) designed to quietly undermine America's ability to project power over China. Militarily, this meant investing in asymmetric systems like anti-ship missiles rather than aircraft carriers, economically pushing for WTO membership to constrain American sanctions, and diplomatically joining regional organizations to prevent them from becoming platforms against Chinese interests.
• The second phase, "building," began after the 2008 financial crisis when Chinese leaders reassessed American power as declining and decided the power gap was shrinking. This fundamental shift in threat perception, formally adopted by the Central Committee, triggered a transition from asymmetrically undermining American order to constructing Chinese alternatives.
• During the building phase, China shifted from defensive asymmetric capabilities to power projection through aircraft carriers and blue-water naval forces, launched the Belt and Road Initiative to create economic dependencies, and began establishing parallel institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to compete with American-led frameworks.
• The current phase, "expansion," commenced around 2016 when populism, Brexit, Trump's election, and COVID-19 convinced Chinese leaders that "great changes unseen in a century" created opportunities for global advancement. This phase envisions Chinese military bases worldwide, global supply chain dominance, technological leadership in the fourth industrial revolution, and resetting international norms toward authoritarianism.

The Psychology of Chinese Nationalism and Power

• The Chinese Communist Party's drive for global preeminence stems from a century of humiliation that created deep psychological wounds requiring nationalist healing through achieved greatness. This victimization complex, similar to postcolonial nationalism elsewhere, generates an iron will to surpass previous oppressors and reclaim China's historical position as the world's leading civilization.
• Chinese leaders consistently benchmark success against the West, particularly America, viewing international relations through positional rather than absolute terms. Sun Yat-sen, the nationalist hero claimed by both Communists and their Nationalist enemies, explicitly stated China's goal wasn't merely catching up but returning to number one status after dominating 18 of the previous 20 centuries.
• The psychological parallel between individual and national responses to humiliation appears in how figures like Lyndon Johnson transformed personal shame into driving ambition for greatness. Similarly, China's century of weakness created institutional determination to achieve wealth and strength (fuqiang) through nationalist rejuvenation rather than communist revolution.
• This nationalist foundation explains why the Chinese Communist Party functions as a Leninist organization pursuing nationalist rather than ideological goals. The party serves as both brain and nervous system, centralizing power while penetrating every level of society including government, military, businesses, and universities to coordinate multiple instruments of statecraft.
• The party's transparent communication through internal documents reflects its need to mobilize cadres across society toward common objectives. Unlike democratic systems where multiple voices create confusion about authoritative positions, Chinese party documents provide clear guidance because the Central Committee requires unity of action across diverse institutional settings.
• Understanding Chinese motivations requires recognizing that nationalism, not communism, drives contemporary Chinese grand strategy. The goal remains making China great again through achieving global preeminence, technological leadership, and international deference to Chinese preferences across political, economic, and social domains.

The Technological Dimension of Strategic Competition

• China's approach to the fourth industrial revolution reflects a materialist view that technological leadership directly translates into geopolitical power, based partly on missing previous industrial revolutions that elevated Britain and America to global dominance. Chinese leaders believe controlling artificial intelligence, quantum computing, smart manufacturing, and biotechnology will determine future international hierarchies.
• Unlike Western companies optimizing for profit and market capitalization, Chinese firms prioritize market share and technological dominance as metrics of success. This mercantilist rather than purely capitalist approach explains why Chinese companies may underperform on traditional financial measures while achieving strategic objectives in key industries.
• The concept of "great changes unseen in a century" encompasses both geopolitical transition and technological transformation, suggesting everything is up for grabs in ways not seen since the last major power transition. This creates opportunities for China to leapfrog existing leaders through superior positioning in emerging technologies.
• China's technology strategy aims not merely at prosperity but at power, distinguishing it from traditional economic development models. Dominating critical technologies provides leverage over other nations through supply chain dependencies, standard-setting authority, and the ability to deny access to essential capabilities.
• The fourth industrial revolution's embodied artificial intelligence, including humanoid robotics, represents a particular focus area where China seeks to achieve breakthrough advantages. These technologies could fundamentally alter manufacturing, services, and military capabilities in ways that reshape global competitive dynamics.
• China's vision includes making the world dependent on Chinese technology while reducing Chinese dependence on foreign inputs, creating asymmetric vulnerabilities that enable coercive leverage. This technological mercantilism serves broader strategic objectives of displacing American order through economic rather than purely military means.

America's Evolving China Consensus

• The collapse of the engagement era consensus, based on assumptions that economic integration would moderate Chinese authoritarianism and encourage political liberalization, created space for a new bipartisan framework focused on strategic competition rather than cooperative transformation.
• Ironically, Donald Trump helped catalyze this new consensus through his 2015-2016 campaign criticism of Chinese trade practices, even though his transactional approach to Xi Jinping often conflicts with the sustained competitive framework embraced by both parties' foreign policy establishments.
• The new consensus recognizes that China successfully fused authoritarianism with state capitalism to create a formidable competitor that dominates multiple industries while projecting growing military power throughout Asia. This realization forced abandonment of hopes that China would become "like us" through exposure to Western institutions and values.
• Bipartisan cooperation on China policy represents the primary area of agreement in an otherwise polarized political environment, suggesting the depth of concern about China's challenge to American interests and values. This consensus spans issues from technology transfer to military modernization to human rights concerns.
• The engagement era's failure stemmed from misunderstanding China's strategic objectives and assuming economic interdependence would create mutual restraint. Instead, China used market access and technology transfer to build capabilities for eventual competition while maintaining authoritarian control and expanding global influence.
• Current policy debates focus on implementation rather than fundamental approach, with broad agreement on the need for military modernization, technology protection, alliance strengthening, and domestic industrial policy to meet the Chinese challenge. The primary disagreement involves Trump's preference for deals over sustained competition.

China's Vision of Global Order

• A Chinese-dominated international system would reverse the current liberal order's emphasis on individual rights, democratic governance, and market-based economics in favor of state-centric authoritarianism, managed capitalism, and deference to hierarchical relationships between nations.
• China's 14 demands to Australia in 2020 provided a preview of how Chinese order operates through coercion, consent, and legitimacy mechanisms designed to secure compliance with Chinese preferences. These demands included restrictions on media criticism, academic research, and parliamentary investigations that challenged Chinese interests.
• Economic dependence would characterize the Chinese system, with the world supplying commodities to China while receiving manufactured goods in return, reversing the current American-led system where technology and high-value services flow from developed economies to emerging markets.
• Technologically, Chinese global leadership would mean setting standards, controlling supply chains, and determining access to critical capabilities in ways that reinforce rather than challenge authoritarian governance models. Free speech would face greater restrictions as information crossing borders threatens authoritarian stability.
• The international system would likely experience democratic winter as the leading global power modeled and promoted authoritarian rather than democratic governance. Historical patterns suggest dominant powers export their domestic political arrangements, making Chinese global influence a threat to liberal democratic norms worldwide.
• Military aspects of Chinese order would include global base access, power projection capabilities extending far beyond Asia, and the ability to deny American forces access to regions where Chinese interests predominate. This represents a fundamental challenge to American global military dominance established since World War II.

China's long-term strategy represents a systematic challenge to American global leadership that has evolved from defensive positioning to offensive expansion over three decades. The technological dimension of this competition may prove decisive in determining whether China achieves its goal of displacing American order with Chinese alternatives.

Practical Predictions for US-China Strategic Competition

• China will achieve technological parity in AI and quantum computing within 5-7 years through massive state investment, talent recruitment, and technology transfer, potentially gaining decisive advantages in military applications
• Belt and Road Initiative will expand to include military bases in strategic locations across Africa, Latin America, and the Indian Ocean, challenging American global military presence
• Economic decoupling will accelerate between Chinese and Western spheres as both sides prioritize security over efficiency, creating parallel global supply chains and technology standards
• China will leverage climate technology leadership to build influence in developing countries while positioning itself as essential for global decarbonization efforts
• Democratic governance will face increasing pressure globally as China's economic success provides an alternative model for developing nations seeking rapid growth without political liberalization
• Space and cyber domains will become primary battlegrounds for strategic competition as both nations seek asymmetric advantages in domains where traditional military superiority matters less
• Alliance structures will crystallize into competing blocs with AUKUS, Quad, and NATO on one side facing Chinese partnerships with Russia, Iran, and potentially other authoritarian states
• Technology export controls will expand dramatically as both nations treat advanced semiconductors, AI, and quantum technologies as strategic resources requiring protection from competitors
• Taiwan crisis will escalate within the next decade as China's military modernization and American commitment to deterrence create increasingly unstable dynamics in the Taiwan Strait
• Global governance institutions will fragment along geopolitical lines as China builds parallel structures to challenge American-led international organizations and norms