China’s Military Strategy Is the Monroe Doctrine in Mandarin

China’s Military Strategy Is the Monroe Doctrine in Mandarin

The debate over what China’s military is actually for keeps producing the wrong answer because it keeps asking the wrong question. Global power projection or regional enforcer — pick one. That framing dominates the think-tank circuit, shapes force-posture arguments in Washington, and drives some of the more anxious Taiwan contingency planning currently circulating through INDOPACOM. The distortion is concrete: it pushes American procurement towa…