On March 21, the Chinese government announced a major restructuring of the People's Armed Police (PAP) that will relegate all but one of its current units to other ministries, meaning that these units' staff will no longer be part of the military service (National Audit... MORE

CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping’s sweeping reorganization of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in 2016 was meant to shake up ossified bureaucracies, boost operational jointness and technical ability, and refocus the PLA on its mission to “fight and win wars” (China Brief, January 12). It... MORE

Though most Western scholars do not believe that a real Russo-Chinese alliance actually exists, the arguments of Russian experts and the results of the recent bilateral ministerial meetings of the two countries’ foreign and defense ministries (both held on April 5, in Moscow) suggest otherwise.... MORE

Information warfare and information operations constitute the foundation of the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) doctrine of winning what it calls “informationized wars (信息化战争).” [1] Electronic warfare (EW), one of five pillars of information warfare, has found its way to the forefront of the PLA’s war... MORE

During the past fortnight, a long-simmering trade dispute between the United States and China has burst into open recrimination, with the two sides threatening each other with $250 billion worth of reciprocal tariffs (China Daily, April 7). As of this writing, the situation remains fluid... MORE

China is intensifying its nearly two-decade push to meld together the civil and defense economies through what officials term “civil-military fusion” (军民融合). On March 2, 2018, CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping chaired the third meeting of the recently formed Central Commission for Integrated Military and Civilian... MORE

African development hinges on a maddening paradox: its greatest asset—the sheer size and diversity of its landscape—is also the greatest barrier to its development. Landlocked countries are cut off from ports, and the difficulty of moving goods from country to country weighs down intra-continental trade... MORE

In his very first interview after taking office in February 2018, new Nepali Prime Minister Khadga Prasad Oli said his government would seek to revive a US$2.5 billion Sino-Nepali hydropower project on the Budhi Gandaki River (South China Morning Post, February 19). The project’s fate... MORE

A new scandal is adding fuel to the fire of Russian fears about Chinese penetration of Siberia and the Russian Far East. The Russian media in those regions is reporting that in order to sell Russian agricultural products to China—something that benefits both local oligarchs... MORE

One common theme has run through the “two sessions”—a reference to the just-ended plenary sessions of the National Peoples’ Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC)—which handled momentous issues ranging from revising the PRC constitution to streamlining the structure of the State... MORE