John Kirby: China’s Long-Term Strategy Aims to Dismantle U.S. Leadership

EXCERPT:

KIRBY: "It is the only nation state in the world that has not only the will and the desire to see American leadership displaced and diminished around the world, but actually the means and resources to bring that outcome about. They truly do represent, as a nation state perspective, an existential threat to the United States. And they are in a long-term plan, as you rightly said, Joe. I mean, they’re looking 20, 30 years out ahead and they’re executing on that plan. It’s to diminish American leadership not only economically and diplomatically, but also militarily. And they are building out military forces, including a very, very aggressive nuclear program to actually deter the United States from being able to exert any power at all in the region. And they have a stake in North Korea. They don’t necessarily like what Kim Jong-un is doing. They don’t like the fact that he has nuclear weapons, but they really don’t like the fact that you got 30,000 American troops on the Korean Peninsula. And if North Korea goes, then those American troops go right up to the border of China. That’s the the thinking anyway. And so they are working as a hedge here with North Korea to try to keep Kim Jong-un in a box while also trying to make sure it doesn't actually explode in any kind of open conflict."