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5 Maps That Explain China's Strategy
The document analyzes China's strategic imperatives, highlighting a distinction between the Han Chinese heartland and the surrounding regions that have historically resisted Chinese control. It emphasizes China's focus on maintaining internal stability and control over regions like Xinjiang and Tibet, while also addressing its external maritime challenges against the backdrop of U.S. naval power. Ultimately, China's primary aim is to preserve its territorial integrity amid various threats.
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5 Maps That Explain China's Strategy
- 1. 5 Maps That ExplainChina’s Strategy
- 2. The People’s Republicof China has always been portrayed as an increasingly aggressive country prepared to challenge the United States.
- 3. At the sametime, China has avoided significant involvement in the troubles roiling in the rest of Eurasia.
- 4. In other words,there is a gap between what is generally expected of China and what China actually does.
- 5. To understand whatChina’s actual national strategy is, let’s look at the following five maps.
- 6. Half of ChinaIs Inhabited by Ethnic Groups That Resisted Chinese Domination
- 7. First, we needto make a distinction between two Chinas.
- 8. There is theChina—with its international borders—we see on maps.
- 9. But there isalso the China inhabited by the Han Chinese, the main Chinese ethnic group.
- 10. Han China issurrounded within China by regions populated by other nations, including Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Manchuria.
- 11. These four regionsare a buffer around China, providing strategic depth to repel invaders.
- 12. All four, however,resisted Chinese domination, as Tibet and Xinjiang still do today.
- 13. The Rainfall LineRoughly Defines What We Think of as the Chinese
- 14. A very similargeography emerges when we look at rainfall patterns.
- 15. The line, calledthe 15-inch Isohyet, separates the area in the east that receives enough rainfall to maintain an agricultural economy.
- 16. As a result,the majority of Chinese live in this area, while non-Han Chinese regions in the west are lightly inhabited or uninhabited.
- 17. That means theChinese population is crowded into a much smaller area and is farther from its neighbors.
- 18. SUBSCRIBE George Friedman providesunbiased assessment of the global outlook in his free publication, This Week in Geopolitics. Subscribe now and get an in-depth view of the forces that will drive events and investors in the next year, decade, or even a century from now. Subscribe here
- 19. Most Chinese WealthIs Concentrated 200 Miles from the Coast
- 20. The economic difference betweenChina’s coastal region and the rest of China is striking.
- 21. Economically, only thecoast is above the median. Every other area is below it.
- 22. Over 650 millionChinese citizens live in households earning less than $4 a day, according to World Bank data.
- 23. Obviously, the overwhelming majorityof these people live outside the coastal region.
- 24. The China thatmost Westerners think about is the thin strip along the coast.
- 25. The rest (500–1,000miles west), however, is a land of Han Chinese living in Third World poverty.
- 26. China’s Biggest ThreatIs Itself
- 27. China’s southern border consistsof the Himalayas in the west and hilly jungle country in the east.
- 28. It is impossibleto conduct major military operations in the Himalayas and a nightmare to fight in hilly jungles of southeast Asia.
- 29. To the north,China is bordered by Siberia, which no country has ever tried to invade or mount an invasion from.
- 30. Except for thePacific Coast, China is secure and contained.
- 31. Therefore, China’s primary strategicinterest is maintaining the territorial integrity of China from internal threats.
- 32. If it lostcontrol of Tibet or Xinjiang, China’s borders would move far east, the buffer for Han China would disappear, and then China would face a strategic crisis.
- 33. China Has OnlyOne External Strategic Interest—the Seas to the East
- 34. China has vitalmaritime interests built around global trade, but the problem is the sea lanes are under American control.
- 35. China’s coastal seasare surrounded by archipelagos of island states with narrow passages between them.
- 36. These passages couldbe easily closed at will by the US Navy.
- 37. China currently lacksresources to build a navy that could match the US, so the country is buying time by trying to appear more capable than it is.
- 38. The Chinese willmaintain this posture until it has the time and resources to close the gap.
- 39. In summary, Chinahas three strategic imperatives. Two internal and one external.
- 40. First, it mustmaintain control over Xinjiang and Tibet. Second, it must preserve the regime and prevent regionalism.
- 41. And last, itmust find a solution to its enclosure in the East and South China Seas.
- 42. China’s strategic prioritynow, however, is internal stability. And that defines everything else China does.
- 43. SUBSCRIBE George Friedman providesunbiased assessment of the global outlook in his free publication, This Week in Geopolitics. Subscribe now and get an in-depth view of the forces that will drive events and investors in the next year, decade, or even a century from now. Subscribe here