Why is Chinese army propaganda on this site? It's not news that the PLA will oppose technology that gives the US military an advantage.
Why is Chinese army propaganda on this site? It's not news that the PLA will oppose technology that gives the US military an advantage.
CSIS is republishing work from PLA affiliated writers from PLA affiliated think tanks, published an a PLA affiliated journal because it does in fact capture aspects of internal PLA thinking. This article is from 2023, it's not written in the context of the current administrations policies and rhteroic. While we can always be certain that there are aspects of external facing PR/propaganda, we also should consider "how does China view the militarization of Starlink and Space".
And to that end, we can clearly see that the PLA sees Space Dominance as being strategically destabilizing. They see threats to their ability to disperse and hide their nuclear launch systems.
In fact, from a 2026 lens, the best way to read this paper would be "the PLA has mapped out its vulnerabilities, and all of its risk control and escalation options (basically its suggestions in the conclusions) are basically off the table. Therefore, it's very obvious that the PLA will attempt to compensate through simultaneously achieving its own space based capability similar to Starlink, develop additional ways to hold US strategic assets (read nuclear strike platforms) at risk, and find asymmetric means of deterrence".
EDIT: Just made a connection in my head - there's been a lot of news about Chinese nuclear arsenal increases in recent years, with a uptick starting around 2023, and the DoD estimating a rough tripling from 2025-2035. I suspect these developments might be connected.
EDIT2: I think to summarize what I think would be important take away from reading this paper is that while the most immediate examples of militarized Starlink use are all very tactical level (thinking about drones in Ukraine), this piece clearly signals that the PLA also believes that Starlink militarization poses treats at the strategic (read nuclear) level. And therefore, if we think purely in terms of tactical/operational capabilities, we may be caught off guard by certain reactions by the PLA/China.
I don't think that Starlink affects nuclear deterrence / the MAD doctrine in any meaningful way. But it does seriously affect "conventional" warfare. And China is rather visibly preparing for a conventional war.
I believe it's exactly that thinking that CSIS was trying to check when they chose to translate and publish this specific article. They are trying to get analysts and policy makers to think through, and make an active decision on if they believe that China will treat military/militarized mega constellations as destabilizing in a nuclear/strategic sense.
It's fair to decide that that is not major factor, but it should be an informed decision. It requires looking at the nuclear risk issues that the piece raises, and finding reasons to dismiss them.
Even the best space comms system does not make your ICBMs invisible to your adversary, and does not allow you to shoot down your adversary's return salvo of ICBMs. Hence the mutually assured destruction is not going away, and the side starting an all-out nuclear war still cannot win. I don't see how anything what's available now changes this; do you?
What might be destabilizing would be long-range hypersonic missiles that fly relatively low (30 km above the surface, not 1000 km), so they can't be easily detected until it's pretty late, and can arrive from multiple directions. This is exactly the kind of weapon that is China apparently developing, BTW.
The article argues that space and AI dominance meaningfully threatens China's second strike (mobile land based ICBMs) survivability, which would bias China to act more proactively (ie, more hair trigger) in escalation scenarios.
Chinese and Russian developments (HGVs, FOBs, the Russian "superweapons" like Poseidon) are all destabilizing to an extent. But as long as none them challenge/hold at risk the US second strike capability (a robust C2 network and the SSBN fleet), they won't be massively destabilizing.
For what it's worth, HGVs that could strike the US from China still need to be launched off what are effectively ICBM class rockets. The launch signatures would almost certainly be detected.
And finally, let's not even get started with what Golden Dome would do to strategic stability.
There's simply no need to go pointing fingers right now. The reality is that all sides are taking various self-interested actions that in the absence of communication or coordination will lead towards less stable environments. No side has the ability to compel the others to not take these actions, and so the best we can do is try to anticipate the new operating environments and be ready for them as best we can.
It really is that simple. Straight up CCP propaganda translated from a Chinese journal, written by Chinese professors worried about Chinese national security.
> The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is a bipartisan, nonprofit policy research organization dedicated to advancing practical ideas to address the world’s greatest challenges.
Sorry, may I get more information on why this is considered Chinese army propaganda?
My understanding is that CSIS (https://www.csis.org/about) is an US based organisation that provides analysis on topics which include Chinese organisations/military.
Not specific to this article, but I generally like to find third party sources to confirm or deny the "bipartisan" and "nonprofit" parts of their about page. I've seen too many where that turned out to be false.
Just today I tried an experiment asking the YouTube Ai question bot "where on the political compass are the opinions expressed in this video?"
The chatbot couldn't get past the fact that the video said it was non-partisan and if they said it it must be true.
Did you read the first sentence?
> In this piece, two researchers from PLA-affiliated National University of Defense Technology argue that
When you were a kid, did you stop listening when your parents said “Santa”, or did you keep listening in order to glean useful information from their propoganda, even knowing that Santa isn't real?
Thanks; I missed that and almost sullied my mind reading an argument formulated by a potential adversary to the United States of America.
Did you stop reading at the first sentence??
Yes. It is the equivalent of reading a technical review of a product by the product owner
Csis is everything but neutral.
It makes a change from the US Military propaganda I suppose.
Interpret: China is a CSIS project aimed at facilitating a more nuanced understanding of global strategic issues through a library of translated materials matched with expert commentary.
Americans are so propagandized and paranoid that they see a DC blob foreign policy think tank translating Chinese PLA source documents and start wondering if there's a nefarious plot afoot. "Understanding the enemy?! That sounds like an axis of evil conspiracy!"
Last I attended a CSIS event, it was filled with US intelligentsia (including the famed Zbigniew Brzezinsky, Polish spellings be damned).
But does that mean they are wrong?
Certainly not. Some propaganda is made up, some just highlights some convenient truth.
Trouble is it's hard to tell the difference.
From whose perspective?
Usually yes.
I haven't read it fully but it doesn't seem to be promoting any sort of falsehoods. As an American I consider any reliance on Starlink and the thoroughly compromised Elon Musk to be a weakness rather than a strength.
Americans propaganda has completely brainwashed you