As the clock struck midnight on New Year’s Eve, Chinese President Xi Jinping delivered a speech full of communist triumphalism and ideological zeal. He touted the China plan as “an epic change the world hasn’t seen in a century,” a euphemism for his vision of a “Community of Common Destiny for Mankind.”
This lofty phrase is not about China’s national revival but a road map for global dominance. The message? The Chinese Communist Party sees itself as the architect of a new world order in which Beijing writes the rules and silences dissent.
Three days later, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi launched the Institute for the Study of the Community of Common Destiny for Mankind. This institute is a propaganda machine designed to justify China’s ambitions while undermining liberal democracies.
Yet despite these overt signals, many in the West continue to misread Beijing’s intentions.
Too many Western policymakers mistakenly view China as a nationalist regime focused on domestic revival. This misperception leads to accommodation, assuming China’s ambitions are limited to East Asia. In reality, the “community of common destiny” is a blueprint for a global order dictated by Beijing — where authoritarian values trump freedom, economic dependence enforces compliance and sovereignty is conditional on China’s approval. This is not a nationalist agenda but a calculated drive for global hegemony.
The biggest obstacle to China’s ambitions is the United States, not for any specific policy but because the U.S. embodies the liberal democratic order China seeks to dismantle. Whether led by hawkish Republicans or dovish Democrats, Washington faces unwavering hostility from Beijing.
This animosity isn’t transactional — it’s ideological. China’s mission is to erode the current global order and replace it with a Beijing-centric system. Their rhetoric of “cooperation” and “win-win development” is merely a rhetorical veneer for the drive for domination.
History has shown the futility of negotiating with China. For decades, U.S. administrations have tried engaging Beijing — through Richard Nixon’s opening of China, Bill Clinton’s support for World Trade Organization membership and President Barack Obama’s short-lived “pivot to Asia.” Each approach has been met with strategic exploitation by China. As every Chinese leader from Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping to Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao and Mr. Xi has repeatedly and bluntly stated, the U.S. ultimately aims to change China’s socialist system, and this “long-term, complex struggle” requires constant vigilance from Beijing.
Attempting a “Beijing-friendly” strategy through personal diplomacy and rational negotiation only emboldens Mr. Xi’s ideological crusade, as China has always believed that both “containment” and “engagement” are insidious designs aimed at the Chinese regime’s demise. Today, China’s ambitions are accelerating, and Beijing’s goal is clear: global hegemony and the ability to dictate trade, security and governance policies on its own terms. This vision is inherently incompatible with the principles of freedom, democracy and sovereignty that underpin the current international system.
To counter this existential threat, the U.S. and its allies must abandon all illusions of negotiation or compromise. China’s actions are driven by an ideological commitment to displace the U.S. and reshape the world in its authoritarian image. A defensive posture is insufficient — the West must launch an all-out offensive across economic, military and ideological domains in the face of this challenge. China’s momentum must be checked, and its ambitions must be actively dismantled.
Mr. Xi and China may cloak their goals in the language of destiny, but their vision is nothing short of dystopian. The West must respond not with appeasement or half-measures but with the clarity and courage to go on the offensive. It’s time to stop playing Beijing’s game and assert the values that define the free world.
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