During his time in exile, the former French Emperor Napoleon has been credited with remarking “Let China sleep. For when she wakes, the world will tremble.” It is doubtful that Napoleon ever made such a remark, as he couldn’t have foreseen the potential of the Asia nation at a time when Europe still dominated much of the world. Moreover, despite some mainstream reports, the French leader never visited China.
Yet, throughout much of the 20th century, China had been referred to as a “sleeping dragon” that when awoken, “will shake the world.” Regardless of the origin, a fact is now very much clear – the dragon is waking and the world should be trembling.
China has finally made a truly great leap forward.
Chinese Military Acquisition Efforts
According to an American defense official, China is now acquiring high-end military weapons and equipment at a rate that is five to six times faster than that of the United States, TheDrive first reported.
At last month’s Government Contracting Pricing Summit in California, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition Maj. Gen. Cameron Holt said that in addition to faster acquisition of the weapons, Beijing is also operating the equipment far more efficiently than Washington.
“In purchasing power parity, they spend about one dollar to our $20 to get to the same capability,” explained Holt, who oversees contracting for the Air Force. “We are going to lose if we can’t figure out how to drop the cost and increase the speed in our defense supply chains.
It is somewhat fitting that the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF’s) newest fighter jet has been nicknamed “The Mighty Dragon” as it is part of Beijing’s efforts to achieve a world-class military that includes domestically-built aircraft. In addition, Beijing has succeeded in now achieving the largest naval force.
Who is Actually Asleep?
A problem now is that it isn’t China, but the American people who are asleep – or at least unaware of the potential threat China presents to the United States as some lawmakers have called for a draw-down of the U.S. military.
“I believe that part of our job as senior leaders is to be candid with the American public and to be candid with our industry partners about the challenges that we face,” said Holt, who added, “They have a larger Navy than we do, and they are making great strides in their military capabilities to keep us out of the Pacific region.”
Holt also said that the U.S. resourcing system needs to be updated, as there are too many delays due to a painfully slow process of getting budgets signed off on for each phase of a program. Even those programs that make rapid progress in the early stages can receive less funding down the line, and that delays how quickly it finally enters service.
“We also have gotten a very centrally and micromanaged system of appropriations that have served the Cold War well,” Holt warned. “In this environment today, it is absolutely going to kill us. We cannot have a system where the appropriations — where it’s in statute that the name of the program is on that money, and the phase within the program is on the statute, so it’s illegal for a program executive officer inside of execution year to look at that and say — ‘No, there’s a better way to allocate those resources.'”
Image of J-20 stealth fighter: Chinese Internet.
Meanwhile, China isn’t asleep. It will forge ahead as it builds aircraft carriers, as well as a new bomber and fighter aircraft. The United States simply can’t afford to be left behind.
It was after Pearl Harbor that Japan realized it awoke the sleeping giant that was the United States – but instead of being woken up again, the next surprise attack could put us down for the count.
Now a Senior Editor for 1945, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer who has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers and websites. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes.
