China Nears Peak Power, May Invade Taiwan In A Decade: Experts

US and allied policymakers are facing the most important foreign-policy challenge of the 21st century. China’s power is peaking; so is the political position of Chinese President Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) domestic strength, Andrew S. Erickson and Gabriel B. Collins stressed in an analysis for Foreign Policy.

Photo Insert: Chinese President Xi Jinping speaking at a PLA event

“In the long term, China’s likely decline after this peak is a good thing. But right now, it creates a decade of danger from a system that increasingly realizes it only has a short time to fulfill some of its most critical, long-held goals,” Erickson and Collins argued.

“Within the next five years, China’s leaders are likely to conclude that its deteriorating demographic profile, structural economic problems, and technological estrangement from global innovation centers are eroding its leverage to annex Taiwan and achieve other major strategic objectives.

As Xi internalizes these challenges, his foreign policy is likely to become even more accepting of risk, feeding on his nearly decade-long track record of successful revisionist action against the rules-based order,” they added.

Notable examples include China occupying and militarizing sub-tidal features in the South China Sea, ramping up air and maritime incursions against Japan and Taiwan, pushing border challenges against India, occupying Bhutanese and Tibetan lands, perpetrating crimes against humanity in Xinjiang, and coercively enveloping Hong Kong.

The relatively low-hanging fruit is plucked, but Beijing is emboldened to grasp the biggest single revisionist prize: Taiwan.

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