Signal China sustains a rapid military buildup aimed at great-power status by 2049

Summary

Viewing US policy as pressure against it, China is working to hold the strongest military in the long run, and the Xi Jinping government is building up its armed forces with 2049 as the target for becoming the world's leading power. Defense spending has grown by more than seven percent a year even in peacetime, independent of the pace of economic growth. Beijing is also securing its own defense manufacturing supply chain and modernizing its forces technologically and diplomatically through strategic cooperation with Russia. Its navy already far outnumbers that of the United States in warships, and its shipbuilding capacity is put at more than two hundred times larger. Test flights of sixth-generation fighters show that its air power is advancing quickly as well.