The Cold War With China Has Begun.

According to a former top state department official, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the United States are locked in a cold war. As a result, the Chinese regime’s growing partnership with Russia has far-reaching ramifications for the Indo-Pacific region’s future.

“People don’t want to think about things like global destruction,” David Stilwell, a former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and Pacific Affairs and retired Air Force Brigadier General, said on EpochTV’s “China Insider” show on March 10.

“The PRC [People’s Republic of China] possesses nukes and is significantly expanding its nuclear arsenal right now,” he claimed.

“We are in the midst of a new Cold War.”

According to Stilwell, China’s successful alliance with Russia, in which the CCP has tacitly supported a war of aggression against Ukraine, has already pushed states in the Indo-Pacific closer to the US, hardening their determination against the CCP.

Because of the CCP leadership’s decision to offer cover to Russia’s war despite China’s previous vow to safeguard Ukraine from nuclear threats, worsening ties between Japan and South Korea with China were inescapable, Stilwell added.

Stilwell explained, “It’s unavoidable.” “In the run-up to the war, the PRC named themselves… in negotiations with Russia.” They announced themselves essentially in favor of the invasion of Ukraine and all of that.”

“They won’t be able to walk back that far.” That’s something that’s out there. It’s all about dedication. But, given how badly this has gone for the Russians, I have to believe China is reconsidering.”

This strategic reconsideration was critical for CCP leader Xi Jinping’s plans to forcibly join Taiwan with mainland China, according to Stilwell, who added that Russian mistakes in Ukraine would likely make Chinese military strategists more hesitant in their ambitions for Taiwan.

According to Stilwell, the CCP’s primary goal for forcing Taiwan’s unification with the mainland was to achieve it by 2049. Xi, on the other hand, seems to push that deadline back to 2035. Meanwhile, military authorities in the United States have warned that it may happen as early as 2027.

That assessment was shared by Stilwell. He predicted that if Xi wins a third term as CCP leader later this year, he would try to cement his personal legacy by annexing Taiwan before his tenure ends in 2027.

Concerning how the conflict in Ukraine has influenced CCP plans for Taiwan, Stilwell stated that the Russian military’s inability to achieve fundamental objectives, let alone adequately equip its own forces with gasoline and food, has done more to temper CCP aggression than anything else.

“The primary thing that changed in my thinking was how poorly the Russian military performed,” Stilwell remarked.

He believes that if the Russians were welcomed as liberators, as their propaganda predicted, China would be far more willing to take Taiwan and change the Indo-Pacific region more generally.

The remarks echo CIA Director William Burns’ recent testimony, in which he stated that the CCP leadership was “unsettled” by the Russian military’s continuous failures and the overwhelming and unified Western response to Russian aggression.

“The PRC has always seen its northern Russian brothers militarily as their older brother, as someone from whom they could learn,” Stilwell remarked.

“That message cannot have been lost on the PRC by [Putin] going for everything, by going for the capital Kyiv, by burning nuclear reactors, and by getting his military shot up fairly terribly.”

That lesson, he added, will moderate the CCP’s eagerness for a military conquest of Taiwan in the short term, as the CCP’s military wing grapples with the fact that capturing Taiwan would require an amphibious assault over a hundred-mile-wide sea boundary.

However, this would not stop the CCP from attempting to force Taiwan under its authority.

“It’s just as easy to win by dominating the economy and driving them to surrender as it is to kill everyone,” Stilwell remarked.

“The first lesson we all need to remember is that combat has many forms, and kinetic warfare, with bombs, firearms, and other weapons, is just one of them… It’s the last option they want to utilize because it’s essentially a dice roll. You’re either going to win or lose. There is no such thing as a middle ground.”

To that end, Stilwell stated that maintaining a consistent policy toward Taiwan was the most critical thing the US could do in the short, medium, and long term.

Additionally, he stated that in order to dissuade CCP aggression, the US and its allies would need to evaluate all available economic levers of influence.

“I think anything along the lines of an economic Article Five is a sensible concept,” Stilwell added, referring to NATO’s mutual defense framework. “Attacking one is an attack on everyone.”

He went on to say that there should be a collective response to acts of Chinese economic aggression, such as last year’s attempt by the dictatorship to boycott Australian goods in order to get Australia to stop scrutinizing COVID-19’s origins.

According to Stilwell, the US and its allies might effectively fight these acts of bullying and dissuade CCP bullying by collectively committing to buy from countries impacted by CCP economic pressure, and responding in kind by temporarily suspending imports from China.

The alleged “bipartisan” effort to combat the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts of subverting the rule of law are laughable. Are we to ignore the fact that the China initiative was set aside by the Biden administration due to its ‘racist’ nature? Surely sleepy Joe has been briefed time and time again about the threat that the Chinese Communist Party poses in the coming years. Yet he chose to halt one of our very few measures of deterrence. This is enough to incriminate the Biden administration; But what of the democratic party turning a blind eye as a whole to Anthony Fauci’s astounding conflict of interest in the leak from the Wuhan lab? The government simply took him in and gave him a pedestal to stand on despite the tyrannical nature of his COVID-19 advisory.

We’ve got a long road ahead of us but no matter the trials we face, the love of Jesus will carry us to never ending peace. Romans 8:35-39 says: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Stay inquisitive in the word of God, and the world around you.