'So what?' As U.S. shreds itself, China is ‘ramping up'

FPI / June 9, 2020

A mass quarantine, violent riots and mounting evidence that of a deep state plot to disrupt Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign and his presidential transition have occupied and threatened America's collective consciousness.

Meanwhile, as "the U.S. protested and bickered, China attempted to strangle what was left of Hong Kong’s enfeebled democracy," historian Victor Davis Hanson noted in a June 5 analysis.

"China’s theory seemed to be that if it’s going to be blamed for the spreading virus due to its deceit anyway, it might as well not let such a pandemic go to waste."

The Chinese Communist Party's response to the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak included hiding vital data and allowing infected citizens to spread the virus worldwide while at the same time locking down its own cities.

Now, Hanson noted, China "has devolved from 'So what?' to the current 'What exactly are you going to do about it?' "

Related: Reasons China had for weaponizing America’s racial tragedy, June 2, 2020

As the U.S. deals with its internal struggles, Japan and South Korea "worried that China might move on Taiwan," Hanson noted. "They knew that if China did, only the United States — convulsed by quarantines, riots, and a contentious presidential race — could stand up to Beijing."

The regime of supreme leader Xi Jinping is also "ramping up its perennial border confrontations with India, as its forces encroached on Indian soil in the Himalayas," Hanson wrote. "What better way to show the world that a defiant China is dangerous than agitate the world’s largest democracy?"

As China "westernized its economy, it conned gullible Western officials that eventually it planned to become a useful member of the family of nations," Hanson wrote. "In truth, China strategically hoarded cash from its asymmetrical trade surpluses. It planted its functionaries throughout transnational organizations and subverted them.

"It beefed up its military and planted island bases in international waters. It compromised strategically important nations by investing in their infrastructure through its neocolonial and imperialist multitrillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative.

"China may have been forced by the global epidemic to give up its nice-guy facade. But it has insidiously pivoted from global friend to its new role as overt global villain."

Free Press International