American Thought Leaders - Leaked Directive Reveals the CCP’s Desperate Strategy to Survive the Trade War: Heng He

Episode Date: April 27, 2025

A recently leaked directive details the Chinese Communist Party’s strategy to respond to Trump’s tariffs.How is the CCP trying to leverage this moment? Will this be the end of China as the “factory of the world?”And what’s behind the purges in the military, the apparent removal of two Xi Jinping loyalists, and recent changes in top CCP leadership? Why did two top CCP officials recently swap positions?Joining us today is longtime China analyst and commentator Heng He.Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

You are listening to American Thought Leaders. If you enjoy our content, please leave us a five-star rating on this platform. A recently leaked directive details the Chinese Communist Party's strategy to respond to Trump's tariffs. time to end the dominance of the United States. In Chinese, they call it wei ji, which is crisis and opportunity. So any crisis will be considered an opportunity. How is the CCP trying to leverage this moment? Will this be the end of China as the quote unquote factory of the world? Those businesses based on the exports are all closing now. And what's behind the purges in the military, the apparent removal of two Xi Jinping loyalists,

and recent changes in top CCP leadership? Why did two top Chinese Communist Party officials recently swap positions? Joining me today is longtime China analyst Heng He. This swap is very strange because in Chinese CCP's history, it never happened. Either you were purged or you retired. This is American Thought Leaders, and I'm Jan Jekielek. Heng He, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders. Thank you for having me. The Chinese Communist Party recently issued a secret internal directive in response to

these broad tariffs that the US administration has put on China and of course other countries, but with China as a focus. So what was the most important thing that was leaked. I think the strategy is the purpose of this internal directive is to tell the whole party system that it's time to end the dominance of the United States since World War II on three fields, economic, military, and international political. So this is huge, because I have never heard them openly talk about this. Of

course, this is internal. But even internal, since the end of the Cultural Revolution, they never really mentioned that. So this is huge. But we've known that the Chinese Communist Party is trying to subvert the US to take the dominant position, I think, supposedly by 2050. That was the original timeline. Is it really that significant that they're putting it in an internal directive like this? Just explain to me why that, what makes this particular directive different? For 40 years, the Chinese Communist Party focused on the economy reform. They tried to please

the United States, tried to get the chance to take advantage of this openness to the world. But now it seems they think it's time they have enough, strong enough to take over. And I think this is the totally openly admit their purpose, their goals totally changed from following the world economy development to take over. That's kind of astonishing because we hear all sorts of things about how the Chinese economy has huge problems.

We hear things about how Xi Jinping has lost a lot of power. I'm going to get you to talk about all these things in a moment. So how is it that they're saying, well, this is our chance to come out and actually, officially take over, take that top position in the world? In Chinese, they call it we the wei ji. Wei ji is crisis and opportunity. So any crisis will be considered an opportunity. At this time, I think they try to calm down the internal uneasy from the terrible war. So I think this is important and every time when they meet

some crisis they need something to encourage the system. To kind of rally everyone behind. Yeah, because people will think at the time when China's economy is bad. The situation is really bad there, and they need something to blame others. So this is a good chance to blame the United States. Let's go through a couple of things I pulled out from these notes that were leaked from looking over the document. One of the things in here has to do with working with the United Front and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs working together to influence the European countries, create a kind of United Front against the United States. Can you explain

that to me a little bit and maybe even just start by reminding us what the United Front is. The United Front is CCP's three major weapons to take over the power in China. Mao Zedong said that there are three weapons that made the Chinese revolution successful, and the military and the United Front and the party's organization. So the United Front is to make friends. They must unite all the power, even sometimes they consider them as enemy, but at this moment, become friends and all the possible friends together to fulfill CCP's purpose. That's the United Front.

They identify some countries in there, I think the UK, Germany, France. Why are they thinking about these countries? At this moment, they will consider European countries will be their friends against the United States. So, the United Front will unite those European countries that are also targeted by the US as a tariff target. So that's the United Front will make friends of the European countries against the United States. Well, it's interesting because I believe the US

administration officials have talked about the need to kind of bring the various European nations under the US banner. So like almost like this is a choice that people will have to make. It seems to be the US strategy as well. So the fact is, no single country can replace the consumer market as the United States, European countries, none of them. China cannot take this position because China's economy is not based on consumer-oriented, but export-oriented. That way, nobody can replace the United States. How can you unite the other countries? Because every country considers their policy based on their own interests. Something else that is mentioned in here is the implementation of a rationing system. Why would

that be something they would be implementing now at a time when they're claiming supremacy? I don't understand this. They actually know exactly why they get rich. It's openness to the West. But now they consider if the worst scenario happens, then they must go back to the Cultural Revolution, even before Cultural Revolution. At the time, China was totally isolated. So the material, the consumer product will be very rare. So they have to make preparation for the distribution,

totally different system. It's not market, but planned economy, fully planned economy. That means China, CCP is preparing for the close door, totally close door. That's the worst scenario. You talked a little bit about the United Front as being one of the three elements that Mao Zedong outlined, the military. And also the third one is the party organization. I noticed that recently the heads of the United Front and the party organization were swapped. This swap is very strange because in Chinese CCP's history, it never happened. Either you were purged or you retired and some replacement. But two

important departments inside the party. CCP has only four departments at the top. Four departments. Those are two. And this swap, the change, it doesn't make sense, but if we consider CCP now has a big power struggle on top, that could be explained. Organization department is very important. It decides who sees power and who puts his people on the right position. And the United Front, even though it's very important, but it only deals with the outside. And it's not considered as the most important element

in the power struggle, internal power struggle. So that's why I think the important person must be put in the organization department. And the less important person put in the United Front. Because anybody can. United Front is a well-organized effort for many, many years. Even if you change the head of the department, the workers will still be there. So I think somebody wants to make sure the other power, because for the past maybe more than 10 years Xi Jinping is in charge, but somebody now wants to take over this position and probably put some other people on those positions.

I want to talk a little bit about this power struggle, because on the surface, Xi Jinping is the paramount leader in charge of everything. In reality, I've been following your analysis, you're saying that his power has been actually reduced quite a bit. Before we go there, explain to me how this works. This is a very opaque system that a lot of people just don't understand. What are the power centers in the Communist Party? What is the role of the Politburo Standing Committee and then the whole Politburo. Just explain to me how that power works, maybe even if you have some analogy in

the West. Yeah, usually, the most powerful is the Standing Committee of the Politburo. That's usually nine persons or sometimes seven persons in charge of everything. So only standing committee make the decision. And sometimes that's some retired top leaders also can make the decision, but it needs opportunity. That's why when Deng Xiaoping was in power, he tried to get the old retired top leaders

also control the whole system. He set up an advisor committee. Once they have the standing committee expand the meeting, he can include those old guys like the advisory board to join the meeting. Not only that, they can vote. That's the one thing. But now the advisory board does not exist anymore. And Xi Jinping, when he took over, he made sure that the Standing Committee is all his people. So that's his third term. He made sure everybody is his people.

That means you have to have somebody, retired people, old leaders, if they're still alive, they have to have somebody inside the party and at the top to help them get the chance to vote, make the decision. Some crisis happens, maybe at that time, they have the chance to influence the final results. I sometimes describe how the CCP functions as a kind of a mafia organization. And so now Xi Jinping is the head Don who's consolidated all his power. I'm wondering if you could just comment on that for me. Right. If you consider Stalin's death, when Stalin lost consciousness, they had to include lots of important people, even at the time they are not necessarily really in power to discuss how to solve the situation,

how to deal with it. Mao Zedong time is also the same. So I think what happened last year during the third plenary session of the party central committee, during that time, something happened. Very likely, he got a stroke. So that's Xi Jinping we're talking about. There were rumors that he's gotten strokes and one in particular, we're talking about July of 2024. That's the only time I can consider somebody getting involved, you know, the older leaders.

Those are not in the power circle currently, but getting involved. But also with the help with those people still in the standing committee. So they made the decision to strip Xi Jinping's power from some certain field, most likely from the military first. And then he recovered a little bit. But the decision was made. you in the Mafia's family and once somebody that had the don for some reason lost the power for several days and then the different family had made the decision. You have to follow because even the underground society has rules. People will see if you keep your promise or follow the decision.

I think that's what happened also in the Chinese Communist Party. The same thing. And once he lost part of the power, it's very difficult to regain it. Because it's a decision, maybe most likely it's a written decision. I think that's the possibility. I talked about the Standing Committee is all his people, but once somebody in a position, because they're assigned to different jobs, and when somebody And when somebody is in some special position, then his interest connects more to his position than to Xi Jinping. For example, Mao Zedong as the party leader, he never gets the chance to totally take over

Zhou Yunlai's position, because Zhou Yunlai is the prime minister. Prime minister in China's system, party leader is taking care of the revolution ideology, and the prime minister is taking care of the economy. That's conflict. Once you have this setting and the different people in the head and they will conflict each other, no matter how good-byed they were before. I'm pretty sure in China currently the same situation because Xi Jinping's purpose to go back to Mao's ideology. But Li Xiang as a prime minister,

he has to make sure the economy is not collapsed, totally collapsed. So it's a conflict. Once you're in this position, even you are the friends or follower of Xi Jinping, but you have your own interests. So at the time, when the crisis happens, somebody inside helped to bring the outside, the former leaders into the circle to make the decision. I think that's the

case. Let me see if I've got this right. I'm going to try to bring together. Let's see. I understood a bunch of different threads here. We have Xi Jinping having a stroke. You believe those are rumors. It's not confirmed by the government, but we believe this is what happened. At that moment, other people looking for power, as everybody is, swoop in, take

some of that control, but he doesn't lose power entirely. At the same time, we have this whole situation where China's economy is going through a crisis. The whole real estate sector is collapsing, and foreign direct investment is shutting down, which is a big part. Probably Xi is being blamed for that because he's assumed a lot of power. This is all happening she's being blamed for that because he's assumed a lot of power. So this is all happening concurrently. This is the picture you're painting. So on the other hand, the prime minister now is looking and saying, hey, this isn't right, because ultimately, if we can't keep the economy going, we're going to lose the support of the people, because that's kind of the deal, I guess.

Does that sound right? This is what I'm hearing here. Yes, that's why we can see the conflict policy. From our side, we can see recently that the policy is really conflict, because the prime minister is trying to get the investment back and try to persuade the whole world that China is still doing the reform and openness. But on the other side, they create some laws and try to scare the foreign investors. So it's conflict. The purpose of Chinese government and their policy is to keep Communist Party in power,

not for the people, life easier. It's not that way. So every movement made sure the party is in power the CCP is in power. All the conflict came from this part. I know, of course, you're not an economist, but if you can remind us, what are the elements of the Chinese economy here and why is it in so much trouble? They call it the investment in infrastructure and consumer, and another one is export. The investment in infrastructure, you're talking about these big projects, building lots of huge things, grow the GDP, but they're not necessarily used afterwards.

Right, including the train, the high-speed train, the whole nation. This is the longest in the world. This is the most important, the economic driving force. The consumer part is never a big important part. Even during the best time of the reform, they don't really care. Export is the major one. That's the third piece. Why is China not growing its consumer part of the economy? I think that the system designed it this way. When Deng Xiaoping started the reform in the early 80s, the purpose is to learn from Asia and other countries. He said that anybody who follows the United States gets rich. It's designed as the manufacturer of the world. The manufacturer for the world, not for China. What do you mean by follow the United States? Not copy them?

What do you mean by follow the United States? Not copy them. You trade with the United States. Your major trade partner is the United States. Basically, the manufacturing hub of the world. Manufacture, they call it the factory of the world. It's designed this way. All the infrastructure, the transportation, everything is designed for export, not for the Chinese consumers. Yeah. But what about all these buildings that they build, all these apartments for investment and so forth? Presumably, someone's supposed to live there one day, right? No, no. This is also designed to keep the government power.

Because all the buildings, why the government is so fascinated about the buildings? Because they sell the land. Because this will never happen in other countries because the land is private. But in China, the CCP took over China and took over the land. So the ownership is the government in China. So they sold the land to the developer, and the developer built and then sold to the end user.

China's housing is very expensive because half of the money goes to the government. The government can get rich. So all designed this way. That's why we have so many ghost cities in China. They didn't really think somebody would live in there. They just sell the land and develop and build the buildings. That's it. That's astonishing. I don't think it would be very hard for people to believe that that would work like that. It's astonishing. I don't think it's very hard for people to believe. Yeah, why so many coastal cities?

They know there's no people who will live there, like Xiongan. Xiongan is the plan, Xi Jinping planned to make it the substitute of Beijing capital, at least partially. So the whole city was built from the ground, and now nobody lives there. It's so many years. So he knew nobody would live there already? In China, the decision-maker is not based on the research study or the real needs. The market needs or something like that.

It's kind of still keep a very big portion of the planned economy. And the planned economy is based on the leader's idea. And nobody knows where the idea comes from. But that's the decision. Well, this is fascinating because the other part is, clearly, they liberalized some of the economy, right? But you're kind of suggesting, based on this directive that we discussed at the beginning of the interview, that they're actually going back to more planned. Can you explain that to me? What did they liberalize, and are they really going back to more planned now? Yes. Because during the early stage of the reform, they have to withdraw party's power from the economy part, and less party interferes with the economy.

And that's why it developed real fast, especially the private sector. Private sector developed for 20 years and it became bigger and bigger. Even though in China it's not very normal, they still have connections with the government power, otherwise you cannot get rich. Everybody knows that. But the private sector still has its interests. When they get more and more powerful, they want more political voice. So that's one reason. Another reason is that reform is only partial reform. They never get serious. Because China's reform is only in the economy, never in the political system.

While the political system is planned, socialism is planned economy, while the market economy is basically a private section. So it has conflict. In the world, I don't think any country success of combine them together. China is the only one. So you can see the socialism countries all failed economically. But China is the only exception.

Now Vietnam try to follow China's rule. But if you don't go to the political reform, then the system is conflicted with the economy. That's what happened in China. And in early 2010, the people, the leaders, some of the leaders inside the Chinese Communist Party realized that reform was going to end. It won't have the power to continue because it conflicts with the system.

They have to find the solution. I think the first one who tried that one is Bo Xilai in Chongqing. You're talking about a leader who was being groomed to be the head of the CCP, tried to coup against Xi Jinping, but ultimately got deposed. I'm just kind of reminding our audiences about this guy. Yes, this guy used to be a minister of commerce. And then he was demoted to Chongqing as the leader, head of the Chongqing city. And then he started called the Changhong Dahei, sing revolutionary song,

and get rid of the gangster in the economy field. So this one is like, go back ideologically, go back to Mao Zedong time, and economically try to limit the private sections power. He was very popular at the time. Everybody was afraid that he would become the leader of China. But for some reason, he got lost in the power struggle. He lost power. And Xi Jinping becomes the real leader. He's the challenging one.

But Xi Jinping has the same Jinping becomes the real leader. He's the challenge, challenge one. And, but Xi Jinping has the same background as Bo Xilai. They all belong to the, you know, princelings. You know, the- Princelings. Is the second generation of the revolution leaders. Their fathers are, you know, following Mao Zedong's revolution. They raised during the Cultural

Revolution. Basically, they are familiar with the time. Their golden time was before the Cultural Revolution. They're good in time. Before Deng, of course. Of course, before Deng. Xi Jinping basically followed Bo Jilai's idea. Which is ironic because Bo Jilai was contending for his position. Yeah, but their ideologies are the same. Power struggle doesn't mean ideology struggle. It's kind of different. I took over the power, I can still go this way. This is what happened during that time. Then, since the Xi Jinping time, we can see very clearly, it's expanded the state

business, state power, and reduced the private section's power, reduced the power of the market, market economy for the last 10 years. It's very clear. I think that's the way they try to solve the conflict between the system and the economy. They try to solve this. Xi Jinping's way is to go back to Mao Zedong time. I'm reminded, again, in this secret directive, one of the issues was returning the capital outflows. Maybe explain that to me a little bit, because as I understand it, it's punishable by death to take your assets overseas, even if

you're high level. assets overseas, even if you're high level. Especially high level. It only means that the party leaders in the middle or high rank, they should withdraw their assets back to China. China. But this is the way war started and make sure nobody becomes the traitors. Yes. Yeah, that's the purpose. Well, why are so many assets overseas? Because it's safe.

Because everybody knows in China, the private property is not guaranteed by anything. They never give up the ideology of the communists. That means anytime they can seize your assets, seize your property. For safety purposes, they put them in free countries, basically. Even though the most party leaders at any rank, they will say, communist socialism is better than capitalism, but they still trust capitalism. Wasn't that already treason to do that? No, at the time, because everybody is doing that. Now, they make sure that if the trade war gets worse, you have to withdraw the assets.

One purpose is to hit the United States because you have so many properties, assets, and even cash goes back to China, so you will lose some money in the United States. Another purpose is to make the party lawyer to the CCP, the members of the party lawyer to the CCP. Because during the war, if you have assets in the United States, then you will consider your assets' interest is based on the success of the United States, not China. So we talked about these three weapons. based on the success of the United States, not China. We talked about these three weapons, the United Front, the staffing or organization department,

and of course the military being the third one. We haven't talked about the military yet. There's been huge changes. The number two guy in the PLA has been disappeared and I think demoted or removed, disappeared. What is the significance of that? Nothing says he's demoted or purged or arrested. He just disappeared. He is the vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. of the Central Military Commission. Totally three chairmen, one chairman, two vice-chairmen. And chairman is Xi Jinping. His name is still the chairman.

And another two, one is disappeared. He Weidong, right? He Weidong, He Weidong is disappeared. And before him, another is the member of the Central Military Commission, Miao Hua, was demoted. Miao Hua and He Weidong came out from the same military unit. So they are the same. But they belong to Xi Jinping's faction. Xi Jinping promoted many military generals, but for the first term,

basically he tried to get rid of the members who belonged to the previous leaders. In his second term, he tried to put more his people in the military and this term, the third term, basically most of the military generals belong to his faction, all his people, and he promoted them, especially Miao Hua. Miao Hua is the previous one who got purged. And Miao Hua is in the military staff department, organizing department. That means he put all Xi Jinping's people in different positions inside the military. And he was purged. It's very strange.

He definitely, he loyal to only Xi Jinping. Otherwise Xi Jinping wouldn't have put him in such an important position. But he was purged. And now, He Weidong. So they all belong to the same, and also from Fujian. Xi Jinping's faction is from Fujian, Zhejiang, and partially Shanghai. That's his faction. And those military people also from there.

I think it's the difference starts with last year, July last year. It's the third plenary session of the Communist Party Central Committee. Before Xi Jinping purged other people. After that, looks like somebody else is purging Xi Jinping's faction, Xi Jinping's people. We see the purging of the military high-ranking leaders, but it's a little bit different before and after. We have this rapidly growing military. I've been reading a bunch of intelligence reports about this. I hadn't fully realized how quickly they've been growing, how many new ships are being built. There's all this gray zone activity that's happening all out in the Philippines and

so forth. On the one side, that's happening. On the other side, it sounds like you're telling me that Xi Jinping is losing his people in the military. Yeah, that's very strange. Xi Jinping never really is in charge of the military. He has no background in the military career. So when he took over the power, of course, he needed to reform So when he took over the power, of course, he needed to reform the military. So he did reform the military in 2015. He tried to totally change the military settings and follow the structure of the United States Army. Yeah, changed everything. But it's very difficult because Chinese military, the CCP military, I would say CCP military because this is the

military belongs to the party, not belongs to the state. Yeah, that's incredibly, a lot of people can't even imagine that it would be like the Republican or the Democratic Party having a military. Yeah, it's written in the Constitution. It's a party's army. It's not a state. And they were designed to protect the power of the CCP, not to protect the nation. So it's different. So actually, this army, this military is not designed to fight foreign wars. It's designed to suppress internal rebels or protests. But even today? No, Xi Jinping tried to change that.

Xi Jinping tried to change that. That's his structure. The whole military new structure is based on his idea that when they or sooner or later will fight the United States through maybe Taiwan or South China Sea fight. So that's his design. The problem starts from here because the expansion military is not a problem. Everybody gets benefit from it. Everybody gets rich from it. Because more money, they build more ships, airplanes, aircraft, and everything. But there's lots of money you can take from it.

Everybody gets rich. But once you really want to get into war, that's a totally different story. So when Xi Jinping tried to reform the whole army, and then he tried to see if he has enough power, military power to take over Taiwan. And then he suddenly realized the military is not as strong as he expected. And the first thing he found out is the rocket unit is not functioning well.

There are two- Sometimes called the rocket force, I think. Yeah, rocket force. Rocket force is not functioning as well as he expected. Because if he wants to invade Taiwan, he needs a very strong, non-conventional power, military power. So rocket force is most important for him, but then he realized this rocket force is not prepared for the war. It's not ready for the war. That's first, he's disappointed with the military. And then he found out the American Air Force think tank published about the rocket force in detail, very detailed.

The think tank claimed that they get information from the publications. From public domain information, I think they claimed, right? But it's not. I checked their reference. They have everything referenced. But the reference, part of the reference from their own research paper. And the old research paper still doesn't have any source.

So that means that they published the first and then quote their own publication. That means they try to hide their real source. And those real source only can come from CCP, the military internal somebody, very high rank. Because any low-ranked military officials only know their part. But this is huge. It's the whole picture. So it has to be somebody leaked information. That's why Xi Jinping got really mad. And then we see the purge of the rocket force high-ranked officials one by one. I think that's two main reasons.

That's a very big issue in the military. And then also the supply chain, military supply chain. People involved in the supply chain also got purged. Because this is the very easy part for the corruption. And the most corrupted part is this supply chain. I'm looking at this leak secret directive. Your analysis here basically is that this is almost like the CCP is going for broke. But to me, when there's that kind of thinking, that's when the possibility of war becomes very real. Is it through the tariffs? Is America pushing the Chinese now to go to war?

I've heard that said. The war only happens in two situations. One is when Chinese military is ready, One is when Chinese military is ready, economy and the military is ready to invade Taiwan. That's the one possibility. When the military is ready, I don't think it's in the near future, five years, they can be ready to fight because they will consider the war is not against Taiwan, it's against the United States and even the allies in Asia,

Japan, Australia. So I don't think they are ready for that. But another way, possibility is when the CCP's ruling power is in danger. So they need to switch people's focus to the outside and they need the war to prove their legitimacy of the rule. That's the only possibility. But I don't think currently they are ready for that because they are still purging the military high-ranking leaders. Because they are still purging the military high-ranking leaders. If you remember, the Soviet Red Army, before World War II, started purging all the military leaders, high-ranking officials. At the beginning of World War II, the invasion of Nazi Germany into the Soviet Union, the first month they

lost one million armed forces because nobody knows how to fight. Anybody who knows how to fight got purged or killed by Stalin. So now you are purging those military high rank officials, how can you make the war? You know, I think it's very difficult. Besides, I think if CCP's military is not ready, and then that war will accelerate the collapse of the CCP regime. of the CCP regime. Why? If you cannot win the war, then you lose the support of the people and the support of the party itself.

Bottom line, what is the impact of this tariff approach that the Trump administration has imposed on China and related neighboring countries? I think neighboring countries, Xi Jinping just visited three countries—Vietnam, Cambodia, and Malaysia. Those countries are following China's path to trade with the United States, especially Vietnam. In some fields, export fields, there are competition. They compete with each other, not help each other. So I don't think it will help China to get support from those Southeast Asia countries. There's no way.

You can see Vietnam. Vietnam made lots of promise, but never really keep the promise to CCP. They try to keep the promise to United States. They want to zero tariff with United States, not China. I think they try to get zero tariff as the way to fight the United States. I think yesterday they claimed they have the zero tariff policy to 45 countries. Less developed countries. So I think the tariff impact is huge. Because currently the three major drive force for the Chinese economy are already failed.

It's consumer and infrastructure. It's totally failed. And now they have only one way to get the economy forward, which is the export. That's the only way, but the tariff will stop the major part of their exports income. And without this money from the United States, there are other projects that are gone. For example, the Belt and the road. The belt road is based on a belt road that basically you invest money, and most likely you cannot get the investment back because those countries are not stable, and the economy is not stable, politics are not stable, the whole environment is not stable.

They try to get the money from the United States to invest in those belt and road. Once the money is stopped from the United States, then the belt road and the other good good bricks. The bricks are also based on China's economy, not other things. I don't think those countries have ideology or any similarity except want to get some benefit from the trade with China So other projects will get failed. CCP's other projects. For example, Panama just canceled the Belt Road contract with China. Italy, I think, canceled. So the Belt Road will shrink. China's influence in the world will shrink, because mostly their influence is based on the money to buy, especially, African countries. But the money comes from trade with the... So this is a huge impact. And also inside China, there's more and more information come out.

Those businesses based on the exports are all closing now. And there were lots of people who won't have job. And the whole society will be in a mess. That's what I think the CCP is very afraid of. So many people don't have a job, and they cannot create a job. So many years, they're based on the export. Their economy is not built on the consumer, not based on manufacturing something for the people inside China to consume. You cannot change the whole structure overnight.

That's the problem. This has been an amazing conversation. As we finish up, let's talk about this. We're talking right almost exactly after this new covid.org website has appeared from the White House, which changes the game in a whole bunch of ways, very relevant to China. And I want to get you to comment on that, what you think about this.

I was so surprised yesterday, I saw the website, the new website. It's a game changer. Exactly, it's a game changer, because the United States government never really blamed China for the pandemic. I think for so many years, so many governments tried to avoid blaming China for that, blaming CCP for that. The only country that did that is Australia, and Australia got punished. It's like a small trade war. They banned lots of Australian product imports into China. And now this is the United States government's formal stand. So I think this is huge. Especially not only the CCP didn't prevent the spread of the pandemic, but also the cause is man-made cause. So this is not a natural disaster, this is a man-made disaster.

I was discussing this with people. At the very least, we know that for years they had really shoddy practices at this lab, which was experimenting on very problematic viruses and so forth. At the very least, and at the worst, well... Yeah, gain of function. This webpage is directly made sure the United States won't let it go. It's not something small we can let it go. We still remember that. Even the website didn't say that, but I think the following will be in the lawsuit. There were a number of lawsuits that I've had people on who were launching lawsuits specifically to hold the Chinese regime accountable. I saw also yesterday, Jamie Metzl announced

model legislation to hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable. So this is very much in line with what you're saying. Yeah, I think this is a whole new effort. I think it has something to do with the terror of war, even though it didn't say. But this puts the United States on the high ground, I think at least high ground, because every country is the victim of the pandemic.

The Leibniz is one accident, I think. Or maybe not. Nobody knows. China won't let anybody to do the investigation. And the United Nations sends delegates to investigate, but with the conflict-involved person inside. So you won't get any truth. But even if you went to China, you won't get any truth.

China CCP is very good at destroying the evidences. But still, the CCP is responsible for cover-up. Because when they spread inside China, and nobody knows what happened there, and everybody is not prepared for a pandemic, and actually CCP, Xi Jinping already know exactly what happened in Wuhan, but they try to hide. And that's the reason why spread all over the world. That's fully their responsibility. So I think the cover-up for the accountability, the cover-up is more important than the origin of the Well, the cover-up and then also the sort of stopping internal transportation, but

demanding an international transportation. I remember that. They let the international flights to other countries. In fact, they protested when people wanted to stop them, if I recall correctly. So there's all these different dimensions here. Yeah, that's what happened. You can assume that's their intention. their intention. I think this is very important because the whole world put a pause key for two years and nobody takes responsibility. I think this is not fair. Last question. Some analysts have described this as the most dangerous time since World War II for the world. What do you think? I think it's the most important time since World War II. I wouldn't say it's dangerous. Danger is

always there. Since the CCP started started trade war without declaring the war. Without declaring the war. Long time ago, you mean? Yeah, unless this is only fight back, it's not the United States started the trade war or any other war. And the tariff war is also the same thing. China has the tariff and the non-tariff barrier. So the United States just fight back, make it equal, the fair trade. So I think that the danger is always there.

I think that the important thing is the United States realize the situation and face the situation. So all the steps the United States takes is recognize all the problems and try to solve it. And then I think this is the... rewrites the rules since the World War II. Because since the World War II, especially since 1970s, the globalization is the trend. But now you find out the whole world is hard to... collaborate, very difficult, because it's a totally different system,

totally different idea, even totally different civilization. So the conflict prevents the globalization actually, but now it's time to realize that. Also, the United States used to have the policy against the Soviet Union to connect CCP and against the Soviet Union. That's what happened in the early 70s. They wanted to use China against the Soviet Union to leverage it. Yeah, but after the 1990s, when the Soviet Union collapsed, and supposedly the game shouldn't have changed. Yeah, but I don't think the United States made any change. And then CCP took advantage of the globalization, especially when they joined the WTO.

But they abused the WTO, abused this globalization. Now the United States realized this is about the state security, about you cannot rely on somebody trying to take over and destroy you. So I think it's a fact, just being ignored for a long time. Well, Hung He, it's such a pleasure to have had you on. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you all for joining Hung He and me on this episode of American Thought Leaders. I'm your host, Jan Jekielek.