BLUF

A retired three-star US General, Charles Hooper, discusses how China learns from current conflicts, particularly the US role in such conflicts.

Summary

In this article—retired US three-star—General Hooper notes the following:
  • The PLA is keen to learn as much as possible from existing and past conflicts.
  • It engages in aggressive intelligence gathering to obtain information about such conflicts.
  • Important to remember that the PLA is not like western defence forces; it is a political organisation that is required to also engage in warfighting.
  • In recent years China has focussed on power projection.
  • China will have noted that Russia possessed overwhelming combat power, but Ukraine was able to counter this by engaging in asymmetric warfare.
  • Regarding Taiwan, the Ukraine conflict clearly shows that a well-supplied defender is difficult to beat.
  • An important point to note is that deterrence signalling by both Russia and the USA failed to stop Russia from invading Ukraine.

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