China staged a massive military parade in Beijing. New weapons were unveiled and a clear message delivered.
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China held a massive military parade featuring all sorts of new weaponry now in the hands of the People's Liberation Army
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Sure, it was a flashy event, but was it enough to keep members of the U.S. intelligence community up at night
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I talked to one to find out. All right, I'm joined now by John Mollick
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You are a war and intelligence officer in the United States military. First question I have for you, John
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Initial impressions from the Chinese military parade. Well, I would say it's this year is just as good as any other year in terms of them putting on a show
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I think they did a great job with that. If you spend the amount of time and resources that the CCP does to showcase to the world, really the world is really secondary
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It's their own people first and then their neighbors second and then kind of the world as a third
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But if they're going to put all that time and resources in that, then listen, they put on a great show
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And it looks good and everyone can can march in step and they look very professional
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And, you know, kudos to them if that's the goal. You know, certainly the comparison would be the popular comparison would be, well, the United States Army just put out a parade a few months ago down in D.C
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And holy cow, there's this one picture of one soldier with a drone
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And, you know, if you compare that to the Chinese display, then holy cow, the Chinese would win a war
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You know, I hate to sound like I'm mocking because really, really, I'm not
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It was a very professional display. But again, at the end of the day, it's a display
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And it's the ability to use that equipment, that equipment to operate efficiently as it was designed
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based on whatever capabilities and technologies the Chinese are pretending to have or do have
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depending on the system, is really what matters at the end of the day
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So it's great that it looks pretty, but it looks pretty. Right, right
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Right. Yeah. And to your point, you know, the Chinese, the modern Chinese military hasn't really been in a conflict to be battle tested and improve these systems in combat
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To your point, John, you said there is it was it was a display. It seemed like there was three kind of categories of items that got more attention than others Just kind of want to go through these things and pepper you for some questions on it The first category was kind of the Chinese nuclear triad
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We saw some new ICBMs that were claimed to be capable of hitting continental United States
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There were some new submarines that were displayed and some new jets
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along with nuclear-capable missiles. So obviously, you know, the Chinese military is trying to present their nuclear triad as powerful
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They don't have as many warheads as the U.S. and as Russia does. They're building that capacity up
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What was your thoughts on the on the Chinese nuclear triad? Yeah, so the the other half of the coin, the other side of the coin from what we were talking about earlier in terms of a display
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You know, we have to give our respect, if you will. we have to note that the Chinese really are putting time, effort, and energy on top of their
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display to the equipment that is important, let's say. They are trying to mirror the United States
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and some of the other countries like Russia and the more powerful militaries in the world
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Britain, Australia, and others, and investing in the equipment that really is going to matter
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and matter for their strategic purposes. So if you want to be a regional power that wants to be
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left alone, which is ultimately the CCP's goal, left alone in the Eastern Hemisphere
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the first and second island chain, then you want to be able to have a nuclear triad. And if you
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can have that capability, then great that you can match the United States and Russia. And when I say
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match, I mean, at least from strategic purpose, I don't mean necessarily their ultimate capability
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or as you mentioned, the number of warheads. So yes, it is a very different perspective when a
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country has the the ability to conduct a potential nuclear attack against the united states homeland
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from air sea or um or land base then yeah then that that's that's a problem that the united states
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would rather not deal with if as opposed to dealing with it so they're upgrading those
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weapon systems they're they're trying to increase the the the ultimate range of their icbms it's
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It's good on them to do that. And again, from their perspective
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And so yes, and it's something that we should pay attention to They underwater vehicles that you had mentioned There this one 35 I believe or underground or underwater rather uncrewed drone they call it
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And yeah, that's an advancement. In particular, if you notice in that piece of equipment
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there wasn't any fins at all. There aren't any fins at all. So they're trying to reduce their
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acoustic signature. That's really how you are able to identify submarines and other vessels
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like that underwater is based on the acoustic signature. There's other technologies too, but nonetheless, so they're making advancements in that
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Sure. Yeah, some of the other categories that I saw were the, you mentioned the unmanned systems
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They had, you know, helicopters, fixed-wing assets, obviously the unmanned underwater assets, and then also there was a heavy display of missiles, right, to back up the Chinese
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strategy of the anti-access area denial, which is the strategy to keep the U.S. at bay
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To that end, John, was there anything that you saw that kind of kept you up
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Is there anything that you saw that maybe isn't getting the attention or wasn't getting
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the attention it deserves, but you saw it and you're like, man, the U.S. really needs
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to pay attention to this? Yeah, I would say no, and only because the United States has put a lot of focus on
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on determining what exactly China is building. We've been doing it for a few decades now. This
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isn't anything that's new to us or any of our allies. And there wasn't any particular piece
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of equipment we didn't know about or some technology that they released that we thought
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was like, oh man, we didn't know that they had that now that they proved that they've had that. That's just not the case. The IC is pretty good at what they do
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Well, that's good to hear as an American citizen. The last question I had for you, John
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And we kind of talked about this at the beginning. Obviously, the message of of the parade itself is one of deterrence
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You know, China is saying, hey, America, back off. But they also welcomed in the leaders of let's call it Team Hate America
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You have leaders of Russia, North Korea, Iran, about two dozen other countries there
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What kind of message does that send to the United States Chinese neighbors rest of the world to have so many adversarial administrations to the United States all gathered in one place It messaging and it effective messaging
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And there's multiple layers to this stuff. There's a political message. There's a strategic message
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There's a tactical military message. It's all combined into this big thing. It's all a showcase
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And I would say that really the relationship between those, you could say, potential adversaries of the United States coming together and shaking hands and being all lovey, that is important. It really is
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The fact that North Korean soldiers are fighting in Ukraine and North Korea is gathering a bunch of information on what drone and counter drone warfare is like today, right now, in the trenches, and then sharing that information with the Chinese, sharing that information with the Russians, and then demonstrating that over dinner and shaking hands
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Yeah, it sends a message to the United States that you're not the only world superpower
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And if we have enough friends, then we could be formidable in our own right
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Again, everything needs to be kept into perspective. If you gather those, the GDPs of those countries that are together, if you take out China, it's quite literally nothing, right? The Russian economy is the size of Texas. So there's perspective everywhere
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But it used to be the size of Texas. I don't know if it still is. Sure. Sure. Sure. Good point. Good point. No, nonetheless. I mean, again, from a strategic messaging standpoint, if you want to get under the skin of any POTUS, regardless of it's this one or not, and to showcase solidarity, then yeah, you do that
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And it's something we pay attention to. And we add it to the calculus when we're doing our discussions with the State Department
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And what does this ultimately mean? Is the relationship really real? You know, what's the depth to that relationship
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It's one thing to invite Kim Jong Un and his train to come down and hang out and have dinner
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But what does that what does it mean behind the scenes? What are they really talking about at dinner
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Is Russia just saying this and bringing him in to say, this is going to be a great show
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But, you know, I'm never really going to do anything Kim Jong Un at the end of the day. So we'll see. But sure, it certainly sends a message
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all right sir john really appreciate your time as always uh look forward to talking
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to you again down the road anytime right thanks
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