communist party congress in beijing. is live coverage on c-span. bloc >>ou're like the pied piper of chintaiwan analysts. >> all right. okay. everyone.afternoon, welcome to the global taiwan institute. i'mame is russell hsiao, the executive director here at gti. 501(c)(3) think-tank

dedicated to taiwan policy research and analysis. themission is to enhance u.s. taiwan relationship through public education. we undertake several major include a weekly publication called the global where weth brief, invite experts to contribute timely articles. we also have a seminar series that you are a participating in today where we invite practitioners as well as scholars to focus on current developments related to policy affect the u.s.-taiwan relationship. coming up very shortly we will hosting our inaugural annual symposium on september 14th and this is going to be our flagship event. turnoutpecting a large of people within government as think-tankdemia and experts who are interested in taiwan. the purpose of thennual tesblh is

relationship.e and sof you're not already registered, please do so on our website. we also have least where wehip program encourage taiwanese as well as americ schols who are interested to conduct field research itaiwan andsptilyoraine eylu cnsor and our advisor, one of our advisors, richard fisher, who is here today, and our verynot lst, important staff members at gti who make all our programs

possible and they are... names]g very importan interns, as well. so as the fall semester kicks gear and if you haven't found an internship already i invite you to please apply. if not this semester then the next. begin today's program, let's start. so every five years, roughly around 2,000 party delegates of the chinese communist party convenes in beijing. the purpose of these party congresses is to establish or update thearty line, constitution, and most importantly to select its senior leaders. given the opacity of chinese elite politics the prelude to every party congress always officials falling from grace or rising from obscurity. emerge ins who will

the ccp, standing committee and the central military commission of intenseducts internal jockeying for power in the world's largest party state army and will have significant consequences on the policies of the people's republic of china. the highest party official and thus the most powerful person in china is the general secretary ccp.e by convention the general five-yearserveswo of 10.or a total general xi jinping took power in 2012. the all eyes are set on 19th party congress slated for this fall. the leaders of all the all-powerful standing committee offer material signals into the direction of how the prc policy will be the next for at least five years. members of the current bureau as well as the central commission are set to retire. theably nowhere could

impact of a shift in the current approach on policy be greater than in the case towards taiwan. the general secretary wields enormous power and could end the state of hostility by deciding to make peace with taiwan. perhaps more practically, he could and should end the current of highe in t freeze level government dialogue with taipei. on the other hand, he could allow the military brass t dictat an even more heavy handed and belligerent posture against taiwan. under the ccp, the general chairs interagency policy setting process through smalliwanese leadg group that's compromised of top level party, state and milita forcials responsible taiwan. membership in this body varied from administration to suggeing that, it may reveal the towardstion's policy taiwan.

for instance, a veteran of intelligencey was once the leading secretary general and served as a member the leading small group during the third taiwan strait lobbedin which they missiles towards taiwan to voters.te taiwanese was quite successful in securing a greater role for the litary in taiwan policy. the 19th party congress occurring this fall, whi a report card of the first ter and with the annual we gleanwhat might from how the makeup of the will tell us and afct how the xi jinping administration will appach remainder of his administration? intense speculation int they might t be line -- and that xi loyalists et a extraordinary

promotion into the standing committee. furthermore, the confirmation that the formecommander ofhe will replace ae general as chief of theoint department at the central mitary commission all could bearings in terms of how china approaches taiwan and ofers a kaleidoscope different possibilities in terms howhe policies of china are forward we're in for a very special have toy because assembled a group ofxpertsho to help usand outs theern the probable from possible. ott is the associate director for asia pific policy, as well as a member of the party rand graduatechoo faculty. to his left we have richard

mcgregor. richard is a renowned journalist erved as the washington bureau chief from 2011 to 2014. he is the author of the party, secret world of china's communist rulers. he's ao the author of a book on china, japan and the united and we're really eagerly anticipating the release of that him here toan host have a discussion about it. last, but not least we have christopher johnson who is a advisor and holds a freeman chair in china sdies. an accomplished asian affairs specialist, no stranger to the people in this room. nearly two spent decades serving in t u.s. government in thegence and foreign affairs community and has extensive experience in analyzing and working in aa on iues.ational he has frequently advised senior white house, congressional, military and foreign officials the chinese leadership and on beijing's foreign and security policies. let's begin.

in keeng with our format of our discussions in the past, i prepared a series of questions that i'll ask each of the speaker the speakers are free to wgh in on the questions that are directed at the other speakers. about 15eserve minutes at the end of the scussion for audience q and a. like tord, i would start with you. you argued in your semin 2010 book, that the modern chinese state still runs on soviet hardwa. chinesethe role of the communist party and the policy proces particularly as it taiwan? to >> thanks, russell and thanks for having me here. if you see me peeking at my because ine that was got the time wrong for this event and i didn't print out my so i'm looking at my drop box. and i might even struggle to read that, actually. the role of the party, i don't think there's any much doubt that the role of the party and the party secretary

xi jinping has strengthened since he took over in 2012. weakest state council for a long time, a much stronger role for the particular members anti-corruption bureau, i think we've also seen that line, more central control and tougher line extend taiwan policy, as well. if you look at the statements out of the head of the taiwan affairs office, this is where i my notes because i wanted to get his words exactly he's really stopped talking about or paying lip even to giving much room for or taking much note of taiwan's distinctive quote/unquote docratic system. howalks openly now about

the one country two systems idea taiwan justplied to as it's been applied to hong also see what's happened there. to use his phrase, he ss beijing should seek a spiritual matching between the people of the two sides of the strait to enablehen solidarity and materialization of long-term stability. ere should be a proper handng of the systemic differences between the two sides of the strait aft reunification. in other words, it will be the in control in taipei, should unification on whatever thes and not even i think room that hong kong was given after 1997. that i guess might be cyclic change. ddp government in

ccp's, obviously, the titude to the kmt is very -- is very different to that of the kmt. certainlymbering or remembered in the course of the research for my new book about how ping had talkeabout reunification, the sooner the better in other words, when people from ccp and the kmt who not only together andld get do a deal and those days are er now. change incyclical beijing'policy but also a secular change. a generalds, toughening up and just finally won't go into a great deal on the military side, which i'm not an expert on ani think talk moreoing to about, but it's certainly true applies to chinese

foign policy, particularly in pacific. china's abilities, military abilities are much greater now. xi jinping took over a much andnger country than 2002 if your capabilies are stronger, you've got more willingness to take a coercive position rather than an or pseudoseductive one. >> tt's great and would like youtick with you because brought up the distinction between cyclical and secular, differences in terms of how the party has approached its policy making. oious given the importance of taiwan for the ccp, the issue as seen from beijing's pepective has always been management at a high level and leadership serves as an indicator of such changes. so what has or hasn't changed in leadership transitions approach taiwan policy? is this transition that we're nowoaching right unprecedented or are there

parallels in the past that we can draw from to infer what the in store? have >> i don't know that i see parallels. and whathat after '96 they would have considered to be a humiliation in the wake the shelng near the taiwan straits, that there was an clock ticking on beijing's demands for unification. tao managed through various devious ways to wind that back. firsthave, of course, the of a number of anniversaries coming up for the ccp, notably the 100th anniversary of the founding of the party in shanghai. works inee how it beijins intests at all to deadline, but if there were to be a nice gift wrapped for 2021, i think, you

know, there's no better one than taiwan. i guess in terms of transition, as well is that beijing couldly overwhelm taiwan militarily as well and that's a much different fivulus now than it was 10 or even five years ago. >> thanks for that. chris i would like to move to you. it was expected when it was known that xi jinpingas going tao thatver after given xi's experience with from taiwan, people consider him to sort of be part the no-taiwan faction, suggesting that maybe perhaps he softer approach to taiwan than his predecessors. however, this has clearly, not case.he you have done a lot of thorough analysis on xi. accounts forhk the position that xi has taken taiwan?

>>reat, thanks and let me add my thanks for the invitation to come talk today. think, you know first and foremost like so many narratives aboutire around wrong thatas just he had these mind sets. just like it was wrong that he a sexier tao, that he was turning left to turn right. whole sers of these narratives, i don't know where any of them came from, but they stillrong and they are wrong. so you know, that's a very important point. that then what does it mean? i don't then consider it a rprise that he's adopted the policy that heas number one. number two, i think we'll discuss this a little bit later, see this as pressure pickthe pla, pressure from your constituency that, you know, if xi were left to his own devices, indeed, he would pursue this softer policy just like tao are quotehere

invisible hard liners who are pressuring him, no, this is what believes and that's what you have to take as the jumping off point. spoken to whoe are very close to his circle say if you want tonow wt xi about any issue under the sun, look at what he says about it first, that's what really means, what comes next can be glossing and back tracking d so on. say first on this issue? this can't be ssed to another generati. think, you kn does that mean he wants to invade taiwan? doesn't. bui think that he's setting that policy sort of stanceery, and asichard was pointing out i think we're mostg pbably the feckless one that we've seen in a long time. had any time they yi.pendence was under wang jiang goes with the party line.

my question is like so many once we'reted to xi, past all the smoke and mirrors of the party congress, and it's done and we've aldigest the results, what's he going to do next? and having gotten that out of willay, presumably, it free up bandwidtwidth for these issues. we're going to see a return to vision atn policy he s out in 2014 where he sketched out a very interesting framework but then kind of over to the mfa to do something with and they vet done anything with it. also, youiwan policy kn, holds a lot of potential for change. and i don't know the swer to he's going ton go, but it's not a soft approach, that much i can tell you. bit, onn that a little your assessment that the actions xi's administration reflects xi's personal belief policy,oach to taiwa there's been a prominent china analyst in taiw and i just returned from taiwan from

business trip that we were there to hd a joint conference with think-tank there, argued that the risky behavior t past fewby xi in years indicate that he is not necessarily consolidating more of at reflects continuous power struggle that thebeeongoing since 18th party congress. can you give us a re deeper dive in terms of whether or not assessment,th this what might either scenario mean in terms of how xi will approach his second term? is tohink the core of it look at the relationship with th military, whh obviously is in this process. and, you know, if we look at the '95, '96 taiwan straits crisis, seniorry clear that saidary officers bically what they were going to do in response to provocation. got out in frontf them

complied. likewise, which was a lot of watchinghe china community about a rogue pla and out of civilian control. all nonsense, but i think what the military did do was to take advantage of certain core let's call it monopolies that they have inside the system big gray zone for themselves within which to operate onroad forei and issues. policy i think some o this is to be expected because the pla is modernizing and professionalizing and professional institutions care about things that touch on their corporate interests so some of that is natural. but i think the difference was day, theye end of the have a monopoly on military technical expertise. rand, there is no csis, there's no civilian the chinesein system that provides such advice to their leaders. they have a monopoly on ways.igence in a lot

certainly, you mentioned when he was running the show, that was happening inside their system. three, they have a monopo on and, you know, gear right there? there's no civilian expertise in this space, either. created this very comfy gray zone for themselves. what has xi jinping done since he's arrived? he's been substtially decreasing that gray zone, it down a lot and you cannot separate anti-corruption in the military and force restructuring, which i think are the1-2 punch of neutering pla out of that equation. and so as such, i just don't believe that they are off on their own pressuring him to take a hard line onaiwan. hard line because he wants a hard line. >> that's an excellent segue. scott.to you, at is the role of the pla in making's policy

appatus? >> first, please allow me to say pleasurit is to return to gti and to thank you and your the excellent job you've done in informing the world, washington and me least of taiwan's importance and role in the wor and it's also an enormous pleasure to be on the stage with these gentleman. prc?the role of the i think it's important to recognize that the pla is one the prc hasany that in its ambitions to y to absorb twan. far more consequential i think in everyday terms are the economic, diplomatic and informational tools that china uses to try to cut taiwan off, isolate it, disincentive other cooperating with taiwan, and craft a narrative that removes the legitimy of

taiwan and say it has separated china, but it will ultimately be resorbed. the pla does have an important role in providing psychological warfare angles, united front capabilities, they have a lot of the cyber intrusion tools that allow penetrated and intimidation and war fighting if the chinese leadership decides for whatever reason have to try to attack taiwan. aspects ofy other how decisions get made in china, sensitive policy questions with respect to taiwan are something of a black box. reading quite good at it but my sense is within the pla pla has a voice affairs with the iwan office and ultimately remember, xi jinping is a part of the pla. he's the commander-in-chief of pla so ultimately the pla

say, but let's talk about institutional pla as opposed to people who have many jinping. xi in areas of core competency as dint of the fact they have the hardware that would be necessary, the pla has the ability to shape outcomes most in areas where they have and anibility informational advantage. i completely agree with the pla is aat t complete rogue is nonsense, but i think the consensus analysis xi has pursued reform has highlighted there were portions that were perceived to be operating with too much divergence from the central leadership's ultimate control, corruion being a form of divergence. for several decades, i think the taiwan conflict scenario has the properly driver for the

pla's modernization efforts and from theirrything attempts to engage in what they would term as active dense or limited wars under conditions of informationallization. the need to defeat their armed forces as well as any thervening forces from united states or japan and in that sense it might be fair to say that taiwan has played a the pla's moder modernization just as much as vice versa. sck withd like to you here scott and that is xi'sg in conast with trademark anti-corruption drive, turned the pla on its head, homuch influence does and will the pla have in policy goingaiwan forward? >> i want to rephrase it if i say how much influee or how has the anti-corruption drive affected it'sa's role, i think

unclear that the antcorruption drive has affected the pla's negatively in terms of their ability to generate military power. cutact, in some sense it's out some of the dead weight that was much more interested in enriching itself, bing up gold bars, building eess hous, having mistresses. if anything, it's probably cleared away some of the opposition to pla reform and so pla reform let's talk about briefly since this is extremely relevant for tain's security. he case that the a has eliminated the fo general departments that theiously were dominated by ground forces and were used to pla as any run the organization. what that means to the rest of rmy, the least competent at projecting power over distances and in complicated environments, have seen their power reduced. that means correspondingly that air force, the navy, what used to be the second

artillery, upgraded to a service,re having greater influence and shape debates within the central commission. the pla reforms have established new strategic support force that's dedicated to the execution of integrated network electronic warfare or information operations that include psychological aspirations and united front warfare as well as cyber intrion. the plaings help projt power. additionally, they've rshaped plaway in which the actually commas and controls its rces by standing up these commands andar then turning the services into force providers for commanders hen direct the forces. this improves the ability of the pla to generate and command power because previously the an ambiguoushad relationship where you might military commander

receiving orders from a service commander in beijing and having theravigate to deal with service commanders and try to figure that out. now, you he something much the command structure in the united states where you have commanders who command being provided by services. the goal of the reforms has been a more integrated joint force that's capable of fighting and winning wars to use jinping's phrase and to do that under the disciplined and efficient control of the new commander-in-chief which is a title that xi jinping has taken on. i think for taiwan this suggests reforms put us in the early to middle stages of a roughly three to five-year time for china working tough the allenges of how these new operational and command and work.l relationships that means it's time for taiwan to be very aggressively anti-accessform of and aerial dial warfare grounded in an all of society withach that works neighboring countries and the united states to genere an approach to armed conflict that

will make it impossible for the pla to credibly claim to xi jinping they can definitely guarantee victory. csis,y in addition to rand and scba and oer analysts and institutions have done on how china's armed forces could produce a lethal network survivable resilient -- i hope they can move to adjust taiwan's defense incree the pspts oreffective deterrents multiple deterrents and resolute defense. >> sco mentioned something that's very important, we should touch on it. e other aspect here a you asked about what different about xi jinping and his approach. front work department is playing a bigger role now in many decades. its budget is way up, its size is way up and this

is part and parcel of what theard described as party-ification of the party. but that is huge and it not to taiwan. we see this activity in australia, lots of coverage of they're doing it here, too. like australia or taiwan as more passive environments where they can test these operational concepts. so that's a whole new piece relevant.lly you know, it's not clear to me to make thedecision work department a bureau member again was convenient personnel maneuvering jinping to open it up at the time or whether we will see that same person be on the time. next my gut is it's the latter, but that's a very imrtt development. >> and since chris called you out richard i'm going to direct my next questioto you is that has demonstrated a high

degree of flexibility on policy but has been fearless rigid in its political control. you wrote that the system has be flexible and protean enough to absorb everytng that has been thrown it. why do you think it has been incapable of adapting to perhaps it objective reality as concerns taiwan? >>hat's a very fficult question. as chris said, the united front active thans more ever, but, of course, that means ominoust a mber of trends, contradictory trends. in thissecreto people room that the sentiment for weakercation in china is an ever. athink the last polls had it 10%. it may be eveless for the people. it was quite striking for me when i was there last year talking to the leaders of the

new power party, i think i've got the name right, that they don't even think aut reunification. it's not something they discuss. even on their agenda. so in some respects, no matter of political resources chin throws at taiwan to seduce to there's nothing left seduce. that's on the one hand. other of cour, i think strongis a -- it has a democratic culture, but it's an entity. as it no nger has a technological advantage over china which it it once did, it no longer hasn economic advantage over china, another market. i think the one area where chi is been successful and this sort of an offshoot of united front or party activities or is to weakenlly taipei, noentn

matter, which party is in power. you have a lot of very talented intelligent individuals in the governments and beaucracy in like you would have in any country put they're restricted in what they can even what they can think about. let -- cane observe a status at this initution or that institution and that inrades governing cacity taiwan. on onena been effective level and ineffective on other? it goes to show the communist the abilityure is to seduce adversaries. more about coercion.

a greatctually political succe, but a tiny institution. and i thinthat failure applies to taiwan, and it's very hard to how that has worked out because there's no sense that i can see that the party in power will make a fundamental change in policy. >> you made one comment about a very intesting observation, important observation about the sentiments in taiwan for reunification. means inou think it terms of how china will approach taiwan? does it think that time ion its side? is time no on its side? would -- your sense, what do you think, how would impac-- >> there used to be achool of thought that said time was on their side. tnk that is a school of thought ichina, i think it's now.smaller

and the roof is in the pudding long, longseen a time and taiwan is just, you know, emotionally, psychologicall politically away.ontinuing to drift i can remember, you know, talking to the renowned hawk about 10 years ago and i said taiwan's gone, we've lost it. on ourld just give up current approach and i suspect that was not a majority view a muchut it'srobably more popular and well founded now. >> can i make one brief comment? important to disaggregate that along numerous axes. richard noted that previously, taiwan was more important economically, taiwan had a technological military vaage. in those areas, taiwan is on the time equation.he in the future, china will only get -- probably, this is the

future, we can't say for sure, but probably in the future, china will enjoy an even more dominant military advantagover taiwan. probably in the future, china as even more will grow important than taiwan. themotional, national entity space, in the global space maybe, maybe, but taiwan in the interior identity metric, by that metric, time is certainly running against china. toi just think itelps disaggregate this and to see whathateans i think is china feeling probably that it's pushed more and more into the h far fewere and attractive or even pusible foolns on the trick you, you, win you over, py the hearts and minds, seduce you the equation. >> and that's great analysis you,, and i think turn to chris. some analysts believe that the taiwan strait may be entering another crisis point and like,

for instance, the 1996 taiwan crisis. do you see any parallels in terms of what waseang up to are1996 crisis to where we headed to now? >> i'm sure there are some parallels. i guess to me, the stark differences, though, are much prominent in my md, a looklly when you have what both richard and scott have said. '96 taiwanhe '95, strait crisis when i was inhe government and,ounow, as as we were about that situation and it was a serious situation, at the end of the for tvat was a made movie by the pla, you know, to shock taiwan into submission. they have those capabilities now and they don't talk about them because there's no made for tv movi because now, they can missions. those difference. seminal

i think in terms of crisis, what's been interesting to me to ame at it from kind of slightly different persctive is in the same way when thinking south china sea or the east china sea we cannot those situations in a vacuum. in terms of we have to understand them in terms of china's broad, very broad and sategy, iaritime think taiwan also cannot be singularity. if you look at the '95-'96 crisis, what was one of the major ouomes? it was a decision by the bureau at the time that taiwan is existential for us and we must focus like a laser beam on this sea andand south china the other issues go into the background, right? and we'll pay a pce, but it manageable one. 12 years later when they can finally look around again, they they paid a very big price and they've put their theb very heavily on

balance scale to try to readdress that. one interesting thing that i curious as an intellectual exercise is clearly at that time decided we cannot have tworonts going on. modernization, their own sense of their growing power, frankly, their assessment of where we're sitting these days, maybe they could walk and chew gum at the same time so that's something to watch very carefully and just to add on, i most signaled difference between the two toolds, china's coercive kit over taiwan is so much more varied and sophisticated now was at that time. all they had then was the military hammer. now, they've got the economic piece, information warfare, it,al positioning, you name and 's much subtler tool kit but just as bad or worse. that on the military tool piece, and i think i've been in a pubc forum where scott might have heard this dcussed before, as well.

i think the general rule military the chinese taking over taiwan is generally 30 days. saw an extensive discussion some good ago where analysts here said that china a single day, place the flag over taipei. that's anow whether consensus ew or not, but their coercive way.ties have come a long >> chris and richard have both weighed in on this. i want to get your thoughts, scott. what is your assessment in terms pla's evolution of the approach or the tool kit? >> sure, i think that undeniable you look back 15, 20, let's mid990s,ars to the a problem taiwan was

that the pla could solve with only one option and that was punishment, but not actual conqueriaiwan and the only was cise they had missiles and ballistic missiles. artilliary force was the only one. today, if commanded to do so, the pla would have the means to launchedot only air and missile delivered munitions packages against key point in taiwan, but could also attack it from the sea, including from the east. could contest, at least for some period of time until probably aireving dominance the space over taiwan, could certainly deliver at least tens of amphibious assault forces. be a majorront would battle, but it's one that taiwan needs to recognize china is diligently to try to master including by acquiring landing craft that can move very

quickly over open water. degradeuld be able to at least tain's electronic command and control capabilities. theould certainly attack island from inside using forces saboteurs and probably insert speal operations forces. these are all capabilities that changed dramatically over the last 20 years. key challenges remain for the sea andse would include air lift to deliver forces, anti-submarine warfare would continue to be a challenge for them, but it's one they're working on very hard and have yet i think confidence in their missile defenses against taiwan's own launched and truck launched anti-ship cruise missiles. and short-range surface to surface missiles, but again, pla isre areas where the trying to improve itself. they're working very hard at training and increasingly their realistic, unscripted and they're regularly going into spaces where they to fightentially have

and that's hugely consequential because on game day, you don't say i'vehow up and never been on this field before, i've never been in the waters before, you want to say we were there two months ago and we may there a week we say it's an exercise and we've done exercises dozens of times, and and regular routine transits in international waters which are legal, no one can to, but they can serve as makingllent cover for their attack and that can blur or hamper the indicators of an impending attack. i think that's really the challenge for taiwan now is that while taiwan has been modernizing elements of its force, beijing has been almost all of the elements of its capabilities. >> that's an excellent point, to point out in just today's global taiwan had -- whennow, we

we were in taipei, a senior officialvernment confirmed that the pla has stepped up military exercises around taiwan's area to in this year alone there have been 14 exercises, whether in 2015 to 2016 there had only been a total of eight and so this is a very substantial increase in the number of exercises that the undertaking, in conjunction with the number of exercises that have been ongoing for the past decade. remaining questions is for the group, and then we'll and to audience q and a what i would like to do in the interest of time is combine these questions so that it gives time for what i'm sure will be a very informed and good questions. so there has been and continues to be a common refrain that we in washington's community that xi's action has been constrained due to the

sensitivities of the upcoming 19th party congress in that he be able to then focus or focus more on taiwan afterwards. so you know, really sort of -- if any implications of this sort shift if there is one, will it have in terms of, in store what might be the 19th party congress? whoever would like to take that first. it's easy.ways i don't know. your crystal ball, please. >> yes. yeah. chris saidhink earlier -- it's first going to be interesting to see what the partyappens at congress and you don't want to bye a fool of yourself making solid predictions about that. piecehad an interesting recently about debating whether this issue about whether -- the party really had an

evolving set of institutional norms governing leadership governing sort of positional change generally at all levelsty of the party and i don't want to hemarize his conclusion, might disagree with it, but it's basically china had norms until didn't. and certainly whatever will happen, xi jinping has laid the groundwork to do what he wants, if he can, at the party congress. afterwards,ms to me one of the mysteries, is xi theing solid meant to be most powerful chinese leader since dang. theory and in don't want want to get into a only gotalysis, he's two loyalists on the seven member bureau standing committee already the most powerful person, what does he want to do that he can't already

do? and that's not clear to me actually, and i think there will taiwan, but non matter how strong their military not great.ptions are >> just a quick comment i think well earlier,very but the notion that the pla is somehow forcing any of these issues, you know, it applies at least that xi jinping would path, to go a different but i don't think we've ever seen at least since maybe the to late '90s if you're really generous anything liberal or soft line within the top leadership in terms of any single member. somebody -- realistically, not in these people are their view patriots and something akin to hawkish or strong. so i don't think it behooves us, if you want to understand who is jinping, look at his speech

in mexico where he groused about full belliesth with nothing better to do than commentsus and his about the communist party of the soviet union, nobody had the balls to stand up, implying that jinping would if it came to it send in the tanks to pursue china's views aggressively. and i think if you look at the great nationale rejuvenation of china, this is american terms a blood and soil fascist dream. it's thehose here and ultimate forcible if necessary taiwan.on of i don't think it's a dream that in any way is derived from he's getting from the pla in large measure because he's purged most of the people in the pla who could have opposed him. if people in the pla are jinping hows on xi is it they're not getting purged too? this is an individual who i very comfortable

wearing the reins of power. it feels that it's his mission ccp and to the expand its influence and feels like he has the political wherewithal to do so and to push forward and that it's what the wants him to do or needs him to do if it's going to survive. late 1980srn to -authoritarianism. it's very much a discussion that was in vogue almost 30 years ago be reaching its realization today. >> i'll be super brief so we can get to the audience. i think primarily two things. point of the piece i wrote that richard referred to lay out what i believe is xi jinping's personal logic. i made a really serious attempt predictions, but to lay out here's how he's thinking about things. i think everything that's out

there that i've seen is all noise and no signal. howe have to kind of see that shapes out. but i think the broader issue is xi has definitely created new ecosystem inside this institution and the rest of the standing bureau committee members don't really matter. there's two or three people in there that really matter. holdovers. them are what is li's view on taiwan or on any issue? chung's view? we don't know. and maybe it's just they have strong views and they're very these debates, but we just don't know. that's certainly possible. thinkt means for taiwan i is unclear, but what can we see if he has a big victory which it looks very likely he will then whatever his views on the matter are going to continue to rule the day. think certainly what we see as an impression that he does not trust the administration and he never will

hard corehem as independence activists and that view is not going to change. we should expect i think more of the same that we've been seeing intensified version thereof. >> thank you very much. we have 10 minutes for audience q and a. so please state your name as well as your affiliation and please try to keep your questions brief and direct. michael. >> thanks very much for a very very -- i was just in taiwan and i want to assure everybody that the sense of urgency that you all talked about is very real. the u.s. feels concerned that taiwan hasn't developed the kind of determined response and toy're moving very quickly move in that direction, getting otherto speed is a whole

question, but other thing that appened while i was there was scenario where the presidential palace was under attack. and i think it brought to tsai the sharp focus. beennk the message has received and i guess the question is we here in our conversations here, this three urgency period, you have to get it over or else. speak aess could you little bit more to that? jinping, would he move in that direction? obviously, there are many views that. >> i'll just say i don't think so. returning to the timeline, if you will, for a series of reasons. most prominent of which is why tell your enemy you're going to do?

hate watching panels where people agree with each other, that.agree with >> i'll just say very quickly, that president tsai feels the personal urgency because it's an attack that was at her. to be directed but frankly, others got shot. there was a truck attack on the presidential palace. and lien, despite being from a different party was shot. political violence inside taiwan not a new phenomenon. at you itdirected should focus your mind, but it's clear the it administration has no room at all to downplay this and i hope they are pushing as aggressively as they can because the threat is i think as real as it could be. we're on aer or not three or five-year timeline, i think that one of the real challenges for xi jinping is does want tof he

extend beyond 2022, one of the isstions that he will face is there something he can point to, to justify that? possible he can say who's the person going to stand up, great run for two cycles, but years,ot this rule, 10 you've got to go, next person's coming in, that seems completely implausible. may want to justify it. if the ddp wins again in 2020 and it doesn't appear that in 2024 the kmt could come back, pressing point that he could say in 2022, we've something because i can't exit with my rivals saying perpetuity taiwan in perpetuity. >> with regard to the military, the chinese idea of a military incursion against taiwan, assuming it happened and assuming they won, has beijing thought about what happens afterwards? if we think about the americans in vietnam where i was as a russians in

afghanistan, have they really that through, what it will be like afterwards? soyeah, i mean, that's obvious, isn't it? it's lose-lose. occupied, even if a lot of people fled from an island withng 23 million people, people with a of their democratic and peoplethe like, who fought for them. so that's why the military matter how relatively easy or easier it becomes for beijing just seems like a proposition. >> yeah, just there is an dogent of the kind of chasing the tail, what are you going to do if you catch it? let's not forget, china has macau, certainly

not armed, not at the level that up, but thatput hasn't deterred china from thinking that if it wants it it and it willr it find people who wil who will coe put people in there physically and weed out those what are opposed to it and the unfortunate reality is sometimes countries do conquer other countries, it doesn't happen modern history, but it has happened and countries do annex other countries' thinkories so i don't that we should think well they've got no plan for it that public about at the level and look at how hard it would be, i think north korea is another example of a country that also aspires to forcibly annex its neighbor and i don't that they're going to be deit should by the fact that oh, it would be difficult, what auld be we do if we absorbed country twice our size that's having democratic freedoms and is in alliance to the united states. i don't mean to suggest that we feel easy about this, but

we need to feel concerned that much of at as deterrent as it would seem to people in this room. >> gentleman in the back. >> this question is to johnson. expect theyou outcome of the 19th party mostess, what will be the unexpected outcome if the military commission is part of the focus, since we know of staff wasf recently replaced, the defense has not announced their piece until figuring out he has been replaced. our source, there will be another one less than 67 be replacedat will soon and he is from the faction. we look at the 10 military commission members, is it going be a full house reshuffle,

members the existing will be replaced, five because they are older than 67, but for those less than 67 years old, are 66 years old,. [inaudible] so my question is what will be most unexpected outcome of anything congress, that you see that should happen? >> there's a lot in there. so let me try to find the question. but, you know, i think the developmentpected will be to expect the unexpected, you know. that xi jinping may do things that are even more evenal than we've considered in terms of structure , we would say thatment

is really bizarre.tment you don't usually do that. we have a new structure. old norms don't necessarily apply to analyzing the current situation. there is some searching -- situations that say he is under investigation. it shows you how little we actually know about the situations. something that could completely come out of left field, there is a lot of 6 -- a lot of speculation about succession and whether they intend to reestablish the chairman party ship. the gentleman in the last row, in the center. [in audible] --[indiscernible]

>> that does not stay with what i know. there is respect and getting on the winning side. no matter what you think about the party, i think china as a country has been a success story for 30 years. we don't know what is going to happen in the future, and many students see benefits to joining

the party. very valuable network. and there't see that, is a lot of surveys out, these days, some done in conjunction with pugh and the like. they turn out surprisingly high levels of popular support, much higher than you would support -- party.ld expect, for the if the economy went south, my view is that many people fear the party, maybe they don't respect the party in the way of love and respect, but i think the party has been very effective in getting more people than you would have thought on their side, particularly post 89. >> i will take you less questions and then we will have to close for the session.

[indiscernible] >> a very excellent panel. as far as i can see, most of these scenarios are quite negative on how xi might move. what are the conditions for a more positive development where china might say it is in our own interest?

i guess the first one was directed at me. plans,he pla operational basically -- it is adopt what a lot of people have been telling the taiwan government for some time. my assessment of the all volunteer military is that it is a mixed bag because culturally and resource wise, the government has not done what needs to be done, to make that effective. there are a lot of different ways to analyze that problem. on third term, my view is that it is way too early. he has no reason to make that decision now or signal how he is thinking about it and i am a bit of the outlier and i think gg being -- xi xingping -- chrisill disagree with

and we finally get some contention. wouldd be surprised if xi say that. after you have purchased your predecessors, closest allies and put them on alert, it is a risky situation to try to than handoff power and think you will be safe. where this in russia, power was handed over to prudent, but it was only he and his close family that survive that. all of the oligarchs around him got rolled off. the more you make a system like this into a as soon as you turn your back, a knife gets planted into it, the harder it is to step away from part -- from power and i think xi thinks he is born to the throne. he is much more comfortable with political power than either of his predecessors. we should all be making predictions and it is more about making a prediction and putting your ideas out there.

let us know the future, so we should be bold about that. boundary conditions for china tends to be nice, quote unquote. one option is one that i am not hoping to see, but i guess if the alternative is outright war. i expect the prc could decide that if they can really pry away 15 or 20 of time one ticket countries that extend diplomatic recognition to the republic of taiwan, that might be enough to say when i aherited it, there were still ninth or 10th of the countries in the world recognizing taiwan. i had not achieve the absorption of taiwan, but there are three countries left that still recognize taiwan and that's good enough. that is not a very happy who likesor anyone taiwan and thinks it should be recognized as a nation or independent country, but it is probably better than saying missiles are raining down and

half of the forces are dead. really terrible situations we can play games with. maybe that is something china might think about, but it is not one that should make anyone very happy. my suggestion is to look at rand's website. that work came out earlier this summer and i have not had a chance to read it. thank you. >> do you have any last words? >> now, my sense is that we don't know if he will have a third term. i think he will leave that option open. we don't know what is going to happen in the second five-year term. i don't have anything more sensible than that. >> that brings our session to a close. please join me in thanking our panelists. note, if you are not subscribed to receive our updates, please visit our

website, thank you.

>> a look at some tweets from members of congress about hurricane harvey. a local news story about the nation's largest refinery shutting down after the hurricane. a vermont senator, bernie sanders tweeting our job today, making sure lives are saved in houston. we will be hearing from louisiana governor john bel edwards, giving updates on the effects of the tropical storm in his state, this afternoon,

including potential flooding and rescue and relief efforts. that is scheduled for one: 30 p.m. eastern time -- 1:30 p.m. eastern time. president trump kicking off tax reform efforts in missouri, scheduled for 2:30 eastern. c-span, where history unfolds daily. c-span was created as a public service by americans table -- cable television companies and is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. a head of fema, the commandant of the coast guard brief reporters this morning on tropical storm harvey. they remarks ran just under half an hour -- their remarks ran just under half an hour.