
Latest China Brief Articles

Strategic Implications of Chinese Aid and Investment in Latin America
Since 2008, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has moved forward with a series of large aid and investment deals, indicating that the PRC is raising its stake in Latin America to a new level [1]. The impact of China's expanding commitment in Latin America... MORE

Obama’s China Trip: Forging Middle Class Ties
Last April, in a press conference capping his first one hundred days in office, President Obama remarked that the "'ship of state' is an ocean liner, not a speedboat," and that even a small shift in direction could have far-reaching consequences even a decade or... MORE

Xi’s European Tour: China’s Central-Eastern European Strategy Reaches for New Heights
Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping departed for Europe on October 7 for a two-week long official visit spanning from Brussels in the West to Bucharest in the East. The five European countries include Belgium, Germany, Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. This high-level trip by the Chinese leader... MORE

A Profile of China’s Public Gem: China’s Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation
On September 6, the China National Space Administration—the national space agency for the People's Republic of China (PRC)—announced that it has started developing the Long March 6 (Changzheng 6) carrier rockets for its burgeoning space program, which is backed by an industry that has rapidly... MORE

Changes in Beijing’s Approach to Overseas Basing?
Although China has traditionally avoided basing its troops abroad, the People's Republic of China's (PRC) growing global interests and its military's evolving missions are leading some Chinese analysts to suggest that Beijing may need to reconsider its traditional aversion to establishing overseas military facilities. In... MORE

The PRC 60th Anniversary Parade: Equipment on Display, Not Military Capabilities
The Chinese press has announced that 52 types of “new weapon systems” will be on display in 30 vehicle and 12 air formations during the October 1st military parade portion of the 60th anniversary celebration of the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PLA... MORE

CCP 17th Central Committee Plenum Skips Xi Jinping and Inner-Party Democracy
The biggest piece of news to have come out of the Fourth Plenary Session of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) 17th Central Committee is what that did not happen: the induction of Vice-President Xi Jinping into the policy-setting Central Military Commission (CMC). This is despite... MORE

Hu Sends Special Envoy to Pyongyang ahead of Whirldwind Summitry
As part of a three-day visit from September 16–18 that largely stayed below the fray of both domestic and international media, Chinese President Hu Jintao sent State Councilor and former Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs Dai Bingguo—his trusted confidante and top foreign policy advisor on... MORE

Emerging Fault Lines in Sino-Burmese Relations: The Kokang Incident
Armed conflict between Burma’s armed forces (known as the Tatmadaw) and the Kokang militia (known as the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, MNDAA), along the Sino-Burmese border in late August brought into sharp focus the complex and sometimes testy relationship between Burma (Myanmar) and the... MORE

The Geopolitics of Cross-Strait Disaster Relief
Typhoon Morakot swept across Taiwan in August, dumping over 100 inches of rain with entire villages wiped out by mudslides, leaving a trail of destruction including over 600 dead and missing. The aftermath of this natural disaster has become enmeshed in Taiwan’s domestic and cross-Strait... MORE