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 calculates 1,200,400 million in RMB in national domestic security spending in 2017 to equal $197 billion in nominal dollars, we proportionally calculate 348,616 million RMB on external defense spending in 2007 to equal $57.2 billion in nominal dollars. For news reporting related to Zenz’s analysis, see Josh Chin, “China Spends More on Domestic Security as Xi’s Powers Grow,” Wall Street Journal, March 6, 2018, https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-spends-more-on-domestic-security-as-xis-powers-grow-1520358522; and C. K. Tan, “China spending puts domestic security ahead of defense,” Asian Nikkei Review, March 14, 2018, https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/China-People-s-Congress-2018/China-spending-puts-domestic-security-ahead-of-defense.

Phillip C. Saunders and Joel Wuthnow, “Large and in Charge: Civil-Military Relations Under Xi Jinping,” in Saunders, ed., Chairman Xi Remakes the PLA: Assessing Chinese Military Reforms, pp. 528-537.

David M. Finkelstein, Initial Thoughts on the Reorganization and Reform of the PLA (Arlington, VA: CNA, 2016), p. 19, https://www.cna.org/cna_files/pdf/DOP-2016-U-012560-Final.pdf.

“China’s Most Senior Officials Endorse Economic Plans for Years Ahead; But They Left One Little Thing Out,” The Economist, October 31, 2020, https://www.economist.com/china/2020/10/31/chinas-most-senior-officials-endorse-economic-plans-for-years-ahead

Laura Silver, Kat Devlin, and Christine Huang, “Unfavorable Views of China Reach Historic Highs in Many Countries,” Pew Research Center, October 6, 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2020/10/06/unfavorable-views-of-china-reach-historic-highs-in-many-countries/.

For example, Australia forcefully called for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19 that resulted in a WHO World Health Assembly draft resolution supported by more than 100 countries. However, the resolution was passed with watered-down language that did not directly identify China as the virus’s source. See Ankit Panda, “Australian World Health Assembly Effort to Promote Inquiry on COVID-19 Origins Wins Wide Support,” The Diplomat, May 18, 2020, https://thediplomat.com/2020/05/australian-world-health-assembly-effort-to-promote-inquiry-on-covid-19-origins-wins-wide-support/. See also Irwin Cotler and Judith Abitan, “Xi Jinping’s China Did This,” The Times of Israel, April 12, 2020, https://www.timesofisrael.com/criminality-and-corruption-reign-in-xi-pings-china/.

Minxin Pei, “China’s Coming Upheaval,” Foreign Affairs, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2020-04-03/chinas-coming-upheaval. Pei writes that the coronavirus crisis shows how the CCP leaders under Xi have become “constrained by the rigidities of their own system and therefore limited in their ability to correct policy mistakes.”

George Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” February 22, 1946. Rh