I have long argued that China, while it is and will continue to be a threat to America’s national security, doesn’t actually possess the strength it projects so well. Its Belt and Road project is overextended, its domestic economy saggy (especially in the huge real estate sector), its military beset by the twin Chinese demons of corruption and carelessness, and its population contracting thanks to the long-term effects of the one-child policy.

However, China remains a hugely powerful nation, with Chairman Xi Jinping at its helm. It is he who has been resolutely using fair means and foul to advance China’s interests across the world and, especially, into the South China Sea and toward Taiwan. But maybe Xi’s dominance, like China’s, is also less strong than it appears. That’s what Gregory W. Slayton, a former U.S. diplomat, argues in a New York Post opinion piece.

Image created using ChatGPT.

Slayton contends that Xi has already been effectively removed from power, with a Chinese Communist Party (“CCP”) cabal “running things behind the scenes.” Aside from being in poor health, Xi’s downfall can be seen by reading the subtle signs that emerge from a tightly closed government. Here are just some of those signs:

Whenever a dictator starts a downhill slide, that raises the worrying question of what comes next. Will hardliners take over or reformers? Slayton’s guess is that a reformer is waiting in the wings:

Although not yet certain, it appears that Zhang Youxia and CCP elders have chosen Wang Yang, whom Deng Xiaoping lifted out of obscurity and who served as a successful technocrat until his forced retirement in 2023, to be the next CCP chairman.

He is known as a soft-spoken reformer who supports more free-market policies, more decentralized decision making, and a much less confrontational foreign policy.

I’ve just touched on the surface of Slayton’s essay, which I urge you to read in its entirety. If he is correct, and I hope he is, the world would be a better place if China had a leader who isn’t intent on world domination.

It currently appears that most of Xi’s potential may be realized due to the situation within China itself. However, I can’t help but think that the enormous pressure Trump has put on China, whether economically or, through the attack on Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, militarily, is going to weigh in on the CCP’s decision about whether Xi is the future or the past.