a discussion on beijing's growing military power and influence. at this hearing from the u.s. china economic and security review commission featured witnesses who spoke about china's strategy and the indo pacific region and what it means for its neighbors and the u.s. this is about one hour and 40 minutes. >> good morning, everyone. welcome to the first hearing of the u.s. china economic security

review commissions 2023 annual report cycle. before we begin i would like to extend a warm welcome to the commission's newest member, commissioner price has many years of experience working in congress on china -related issues and we look forward to her contributions through our work. thank you all for joining us today. thank you to the witnesses for sharing your expertise and for the work you've put into the testimonies. i would also like to thank the senate committee on environment public works for allowing us the use of this hearing room and senate recording studio for their assistance in live streaming this event and i also want to express my appreciation for the work of each of our staff members. they are essential to the commission's success and today in particular i'd like to thank andrew and jesse foster for their capable work putting together searing. today will examine the range of foreign engagements undertaken by china's military and internal

security forces as well as elements of china's military-industrial complex and the implications of those activities for the united states. the chinese communist party under general secretary is pursuing a goal of developing the people's liberation army into a world wide military by the middle of the 21st century which is not that far away. achieving the goal is a critical component of the efforts to establish the world order in this new world order other countries would acquiesce to china's priorities and preferences and arrangement referred to euphemistically as a community of common human destiny. the activities of other security forces contribute to these goals in several ways by conducting regular bilateral and multilateral dialogues with other countries security forces. the pla is building relationships and expanding its presence on the global stage by

participating in exercises and training with other military, the pla practices power projection skills and cultivates an image of china as a responsible contributor to global security. maintaining robust defense ties with russia, china has thought to learn from its past combat experiences and also continues to pursue joint development of advanced military technology such as heavy lift helicopters. the advanced economies of europe played a role in supporting the development and licensing chinese production of defense articles, the china statement of defense corporations and subsequently in digitized for the pla. china is also a major player in the international arms market ranking among the top five arms players since at least 2010 although total sales remain significantly below those in the united states or russia china has established itself as a leading provider of certain weapons such as unmanned aerial

vehicles. it's also is a player to certain countries on its periphery such as pakistan and bangladesh. as in so many other areas of foreign engagement when it comes to foreign military sales chinese companies have no qualms about selling weapons to parties the other countries will not including the military dictatorship in burma or active conflict zones in sudan and south sudan. as the u.s. and its allies navigate the strategic competition with china it is imperative that we understand both the drivers of the foreign military activities and the was saying incultivating relatie willing to push back on the implications for the western led system in terms of international security. china's military relationship the naval exercises talk to with russia deserves particular scrutiny and the fallout from russian president vladimir doctor saunders earlier a lot of putin's work against ukraine. finally, as beijing continues to it is a political signaling. promote the still vague ideas of the fact china and russia are a global security initiative led doing naval exercises in the by china a thorough examination indo pacific signal about the of the military diplomacy will provide valuable insight into

what the world should expect in partnership. i do think there are these years to come. we look forward to exploring the broader objectives china has in topics in detail in the hearing today and discussing actionable policy recommendations in the u.s. congress. having these types of exercises. i will now turn the floor over to my colleague and cochair for but maybe doctor saunders could speak more? the hearing, commissioner randy shriver. >> thank you. i join commissioner chair [inaudible] actually broader relationship that includes things like bartholomew by welcoming the witnesses and to those watching military technology which is both arms sales and technology online. developments. the chinese party of the the russians are helping china people's liberation army will be as it starts to think about a instrumental in determining missile warning system and how whether or not general xi to integrate that in their jinping's aspirations for the national rejuvenation are met. nuclear situational awareness. the direction for the pla to the exercises do not include become a world-class military by combined arms. 2049 are not limited to they include different layers of symbolism in order to acquire joint command and control. the trapping of the global power there is a lot happening in status. to succeed and meet its own those spaces. a lot of it is a political ambitions the pla must become a much more capable military. signaling. the message you're trying to get across is china and russia can the general secretary needs a

pla capable of sovereignty to work together and thwart specific u.s. interests. been secure over a number of that is something the u.s. has expansive and illegal sovereignty claims. in the pla that can successfully to consider and be constrained by that. operationalize the taiwan contingency for the purpose of that is sort of the challenge unification. here for there's still a lot of the pla to look after broader tension there's a lot of suspicion so parsing how much of regional and global interests that military is real and what's particularly where the lines of its significance, how much of it communication are concerned. it needs a pla that can be is signaling and exaggerating and we should have an accurate scanning of what it means. successful. this are trying to do now to dig it's more detrimental to its into those in a more detail. preferences and interest. it's increasingly clear that and get a better understanding they believe the pla must be of the military significance and the political value of it. more active in order to acquire >> can i follow up on that? the necessary capabilities and be better postured to play this unless we really look at russia's wholesale destruction of infrastructure in ukraine i at least cannot say they've had role. a lot of military success per se. i just keep wondering in the pla

comfortable? we keep time but learning this active in promoting foreign for cooperating on that spread military sales this external but lessons learned or the agenda is very robust. technology. i just read this morning very as these activities expand and evolve we want to know more tanks russian tanks from 1944 about how these activities we and leo sit sending it back to russia for use. educate me what is its they are actually learning from this cooperation? i understand the signaling i will hear from the witnesses on understand authoritarianism versus democracy and all of all of these matters. that. just in terms of where they getting out of this education the first panel -- will provide wise? let me speak to that problem plugged my colleague we recently published an article by him that goes into some detail. they looked at the russians as being advanced military in terms of combined arms operations how they use intelligent get it out

to the field. more advanced in these areas at a technical level also knowing a review of china's military policy. next we will hear from kristin a how to put the pieces together to make it work. senior policy researcher at the that was a partial model for the rand corporation who will reforms going to a brigade address the security dialogues structure by the u.s. military influenced by the russian and educational exchanges. military as well. he short of thought the russians and figure this stuff out for they studied what they did and finally the independent researcher. thank you all very much for your then adapted it to the purposes. testimony of the commission is looking forward to your remarks with ukraine defining a lot of and i asked the witnesses to please keep their remarks. weaknesses when you try to make it work for you learn from that it's a great pleasure to be here as well what not to do. some of the lessons you can get today to participate in the really bogged down in an hearing. my testimony today is going to operation it's really hard to go heavily on a database that get momentum picked up again. the national defense university that may affect at the pla about set up on chinese military an issue like taiwan. diplomacy. it's based on work pioneering historically they want to get work by ken allen but updated by very tight operations security keep what they're going to do a a string of talented research surprise. if you cannot execute what you

are going to do you run into even bigger problems. assistants and including melody whom you will hear from you latertoday and to give an overvf i suspect that is a lesson they'd wave got to practice, the objectives and paint the big you've got to know and do what picture of what china does. you plan to do and maybe it is more important to practice it the pla defines it as external and be confident you can execute relations pertaining to military it rather than so much keep from and groups of country including the eyes of u.s. intelligence or things like military personnel taiwan intelligence. exchanges, negotiations, arms they're learning a lot from the mistakes the russians are control negotiations, and mility making. >> i would add to that on the aid, intelligence cooperation, ground force exercises that were conducted before ukraine wanted military cooperation, peacekeeping military alliance to adhere about operational et cetera and i think the key point is they conceive of this experience of russians coming back from sierra for example in as a component of the broad other operations where they have had obviously more success. diplomatic efforts and they stress the military diplomacy must always serve the overall i think up until ukraine that foreign policy of china. was one of the reasons for the i think this is the case as you joint exercises in terms of what they would learn because the pla look at the big outlines of the foreign policy the focus is on strategic relations with great very small so far. >> thank you. powers, countries on the

looks great, i've a question for periphery those are exactly the priorities for military diplomacy. a couple key points as a means the watchers. the first question, maybe doctor of strengthening bilateral relationships, not as an end of saunders first, i think we can itself a lot of the activity really isn't a very substantive learn a lot about the chinese but it's important in political and relationship terms and one are up to if we understand organization of people involved. of the things that it's useful for as an indicator of the overall state of bilateral relations things are going good, anecdotally it seems a lot of their military diplomacy particularly with the u.s. has the military activity will pick up if there's problems in the been conducted by military relationship it will slow down. intelligence professionals. let's talk briefly about a couple of the goals. and political warfare it can be divided into strategic professionals. and operational goals including in fact, even in some of our dialogue were hoping for supporting chinese diplomacy and operational cooperation like foreign policy, shaping the safety on the high seas you get security environment, operational goals including the intel collectors and the collecting intelligence and political warfare specialists. with the recent reorganization learning new skills to support pla modernization and the type of things the pla does including and maybe what you have observed as of late does that remain the senior level visits, security dialogues, military exercises

case that's a little hard to both bilateral and multilateral. the calls, functional exchanges focused on specific military say. i've not been to china in three areas and also nontraditional years so my contract with them has been limited. security operations including humanitarian assistance and disaster relief and before it was explicitly the purview of military intelligence peacekeeping. if we look at it in the big picture, the bulk of this realm apparatus. one predecessor reported as high-level meetings and a directly to the staff senior pla officers meeting with foreign counterparts, but we do department. now it's a little more of its own thing but there is a flow of see starting in about 2009 people from the joint staff military exercises starting to department intelligence side make up a bigger percentage of were coming into the imc right that activity, and i think i've now. given you a handout that talks there is little bit of a about this a little bit. struggle i think between at the numbers in the database ministry of defense that has show this peaked in about 2015 formal control the joint staff and declined a somewhat sins. department which lost control we attributed that to the would like to submit some people internal reforms which have had there watching it. an internal focus. i think some of that is coming one interesting thing that comes out of the data is the tracks with the five-year political back so most people were cycle whether it is a party intelligence people before there still intelligence people today.

congress year the pla officers are busy politicking at home in make a quick plug for beijing and have less time to go abroad and meet with foreigners u.s./china. one of the interesting things we and finally the big impact of did is we hosted pla students. covid-19 the diplomatic engagements just fall off the these were not all intel people roof in 2020 and 21. are foreign affairs specialists. i was asked to speak about these were their core commanders. these were their senior colonels priorities. the highest priority region, who weren't operational. europe is a second and africa different a distant third. that's one of the few contacts we ever get with the operational southeast asia and south asia side of the pla. are the main subregions. i want to know to this is a careful what we talked to not global presence with more than 130 military attaché representatives abroad. they are regularly engaged in un going to write the military peacekeeping operations about five at any given time with that's one middleton matter that to interact with and take their about 2500 troops. they participate periodically in the assistance and disaster temperature a little bit which relief and maintain a task force is a useful thing to do until since december 2008.

that all provides access to professionals and political foreign militaries. warfare china's its ability to i was asked to talk a little bit about the changes. again this decline since 2015 i think that's a lot to do with deploy more often with tighter control of the military and pla that's focused on capability overseas i think will reforms. one of the things that stands probably find hopefully more robust attractions with some of out with multilateral settings it used to be very suspicious of the operators political this but it now participates in multilateral meetings with the endeavor. >> thank you pretty think it is shanghai organization, the an important thing to continue to watch. who shows up will tell us a lot shangri-la dialogue and china about what they're up to what started to host its own grouping they are doing. such as the forum the china africa piece of the security part of our mission our core mission is to advise congress. forum and the america defense you describe some things that forum. i mentioned the impact of covid are pretty outrageous in terms which was significant. i won't go into detail on the of chinese activities on our organizations responsible for this but the key one is the soil. i do not have the legal military commissions office of background to say what the tools are to deal with that. international military it would seem to me it would be cooperation. the defense minister plays a crucial role he supervises that

office and he also sits on the ccp central foreign affairs entirely appropriate to sanction committee and is the liaison the organization, sanction individuals. what i would like is your with the rest of the chinese assessment. are there appropriate tools for government. dealing with this emerging as shriver said it is a party they don't really work for the government so you need problem? and if not what kind of mechanisms like that. since the joint staff department authorities should the administration be seeking from plays a role in military the congress? >> thank you, that's a great diplomacy and they have a deputy question. there's a lot more detail on who was in charge of that in my report. intelligence and foreign affairs but just off the top of my head whose actively also involved. we need to assess all the different gaps that are within our legal system the nps is able to get to the implications, this is a new area of u.s. strategic to abuse. competition. most intense in the indo pacific currently transnational oppression is like a vocab word and other regions. is not really outlawed in our we are going to see them use the legal system. so there is that. tools and the military diplomacy to strengthen military ties and when people bring these cases are minor legal system brings increase their influence with cases to court and things of third countries. that nature getting all the this is an area that's going to be part of a competition. they sometimes try to use this to undermine u.s. alliances i think with not a lot of success. the trend i see is something different parts of the u.s.

different as the allies and government that have to deal at partners that are engaging as the whether it's fbi, d.o.j., part of their broad china with different issues bring strategy and some for mostly these cases to court makes it symbolic political reasons i personally don't think washington should get too upset if countries like australia and singapore are using symbolic military cooperation with of the easier. pla to offset the substantive >> thank you. cooperation with us so my view is rather than stop it we should we do have time for second focus on limits on it limiting the pla ability to learn from the organ military, limiting round. and on screen, i see their ability to learn the things we teach allies and aaron's hand. >> i have a question. partners and try to restrict their access to the points of jake can certainly go. basis and with that there's more to say but not more time to say let's go with this order then, it and i will save my other which would be jim and robin. points for q-and-a. >> thank you. >> thanks. >> cochair bartholomew,

i have a question for jordan commission members and staff thank you for the opportunity to lankford help me out the history testify at this hearing. and background of the overseas for my testimony i will address role. the objective of the overseas when i lived in covered china military diplomacy, how the many decades ago there is a approaches evolved given intensifying u.s. strategic simple rule of thumb the mss competition and ways in which operated overseas in the nps was the military diplomacy a public security, what was the activities can potentially challenge u.s. interests and domestic public security agency. recommendations for policymakers. the three primary objectives for so when did the m ps start operating overseas? overseas military diplomacy first, china uses military diplomacy to help shape the is this something of the last international environment to be conducive to the interests. few years? or has this been going on it does this by using the without us knowing it for long diplomacy to promote certain time? narratives that are aimed at >> thank you for the question. bolstering the image overseas i would say generally the trend and shaping the global perception in china's favor. the mps activity has increased significantly under present for instance china frames shooting pain. we could probably 20-point to overseas military engagements as thousand 17's most consequential promoting a peaceful rise year. during that year president xi through supporting international security and contributing to jinping gave a speech at the stability. china also uses the diplomacy as general assembly and triple he a tool to capture anti-china talked to the global security

narratives and its own vision of global security for an example system brings how all the security institutions globally focuses military diplomacy interact with each other. efforts and developing countries that participate in the belt and he was very clear in the displeasure with the system road initiative to cultivate calling for it to be performed, relationships with partners that altered and things of that nature. and also that same year there is are willing to join in and pushing back against what it frames it is unfair to an internal meeting of top public securities officials. developing nations. there given the marching orders to grasp the new characteristics it's one of the tools china is of public security cooperation abroad and be more active abroad using to gain advantage as well and things like that. so the database i built pretty much shows that comment 2017 was one of the key years. i also pointed 2014 is another as promote its own agenda. important your investment fox hunt was formally initiated. this is also increasing its security footprint in the island states, latin america and however i think the first data point in my databases back to africa. military diplomacy also serves to help china increase its 1995. military access near the vital i would not be surprised if there's other things i missed economic and strategic interests obviously. so probably even before that. examples include peacekeeping because when asked what happened operations and unstable rich in 1995? countries in africa and security >> that's a good question i have

partnership building. to look at its a bilateral meeting or formal agreement signed with some foreign these activities if successful country. i can get back to you though. could potentially send the range and geographic reach of the >> okay. just one other question. capabilities in the future as well as institutionalize and normalize the chinese military you spoke of their overseas access overseas. liaison with foreign government. a third objective is the does the justice department, at military diplomacy supports the pla development of expeditionary least as far as i know criminal capability, ability to conduct overseas missions through expanding security partnerships division had regular visits to and opportunities to build operational experiences abroad. discussions with the chinese government. is that still going on? >> i do not know off the top of my head. the missions are an example of the military using nontraditional security operations to develop a specific >> thank you. capability, in this case lines of communication. and facilitates those in africa >> commissioner? >> yes, i also question for and of the middle east eventually leading to the mr. lincoln. establishment of the naval base would it be fair to say that what china is currently doing or in djibouti. military diplomacy can also potentially aid in getting has begun to do is export its access to military or dual use model and its techniques for technology including military exchanges and collaboration with what they refer to as stability

the european military and and maintenance to like-minded research institutes for example and the overseas military countries? >> i think it is definitely a engagements that facilitate the push and pull factor. countries like pakistan and gain access to technologies to there are several high-level quotes from chinese officials about wanting to be more active improve their military capabilities. the pla has confronted several abroad and police training and training police with chinese challenges using military characteristics and things of diplomacy to support its foreign that nature. policy goals however including but at the same time other governments, other countries limited access and approved overseas relations and access small deployments in countries have to accept this training and want this training. that are difficult to expand so it is both export and import. without significant additional investments, lack of readiness to take on increased missions >> okay. you refer at several points you chinese dissatisfaction. and unstable countries and the political nature of the military you sing discontent with the current liberal democratic engagements that provide limited benefits for foreign military. order. later you say they're trying to finally the military diplomacy put forward alternative global is beholden to the overall governing division. approach to its foreign policy could you say more about what which isn't always conducive to you think it is they have in expanding military relations mind? and in particular, do they abroad. however the military diplomacy really believe they can activities do have the potential transform business global norms to challenge u.s. interests as they existed and now? through more opportunities for collections against the u.s. allies and partners, the potential establishment of or erode the prevailing norton

overseas bases that can provide a platform for the operational norms to the extent a reflection reach and efforts through the of liberal democratic concepts? are they trying to erode that arms sales technology transfer and military training to build a globally? or are they trying to carve out wide-ranging partners with more military capabilities that can a kind of partial subsystem of the larger international system impact the interest. that will be made up of states given the approach to overseas military diplomacy and the that accept their views? potential challenges of u.s. interest, the policymakers might in particular about stability consider the following. and maintenance. first capitalize on the united but it's not creating states robust alliance and international system that is partnership to limit the access. more amenable safe to exist. china is still building a network partnership with vital that's why we see things like land to strategic locations. the comprehensive national the united states should capitalize on its extensive security being pushed and network of allies and partners brought the global security through advanced cooperation initiative pierce county foreign with key countries to limit the policy extension of the its own willingness to allow china to domestic understanding of political security and things access other ports of infrastructure that can include like that. more security cooperation with i think this comes back to part states in the islands, south asia and the indian ocean of a strategy to maintain political power at all costs. region. second, work with allies and >> okay, thank you very much. partners to mitigate intelligence risks from the diplomacy activities. >> commissioner. the united states could assist allies and partners in >> and interested and we talked

mitigating the risk by leading about prestige and carving out efforts to bolster counterintelligence and as doctor friedberg just noted information security carving out a space for ccp to capabilities as well as support allies and partners in gaining the company is a picture of the strengthen its position. i am curious how economic military activities in the interest tie into all of this. region. third, increase awareness on the overseas military diplomacy, how it supports a broad chinese foreign policy objectives and the import for ally and partner exercises in south africa. i see very much related to mineral interests. interest. for example the united states could considered the discussions i wonder if you could identify with its allies about limiting the opportunities for the pla to use military diplomacy including partnerships or exercises where professional military education exchanges to increase operational capabilities and there are no economic interest? technical knowledge. what sports, minerals or energy. fourth, elevate the public profile of u.s. military engagement. it seems to me much of the the united states could ensure that its own engagements are military diplomacy is fused with visible to allies and partners as well as china and that the her twinned with these economic benefits of those engagements objectives. we have not talked about that are clearly articulated. and fifth consider supporting yet. additional research on the and the follow on question is, if china's economy does not chinese military diplomacy. work, or, what does it mean for topics include examining how the military diplomacy efforts to

expand security relationships are tied to the initiatives such as the belt and wrote how expansive these undertakings might continue to be? initiative, the global development initiative, the security initiative and assessing the trends and assumptions for how they might you wobbled i'm going to go to employ military diplomacy and in the context of u.s. china you first apparent. [laughter] >> and never show weakness. competition so i think i will [laughter] stop there. we have tried to do some of this thank you and i look forward to work. we are finding more to look at your questions. whether partnerships or economic >> distinguished cochairs and commissioners thank you for allowing me to testify on the interests, the influence they overseas security activities of have over military diplomacy or high-level visits. the public security. under president xi jinping, the there is something of struggle to find quantitative ccp expanded the overseas correlations. activities increasingly using you think of a country has oil security cooperation as a tool or resources chinese leaders to expand its influence and will likely to go there or be shape global security norms. more likely to do military it's typically understood as a domestic facing institution. exercises. the day-to-day responsibilities but it is hard to find those include law enforcement and patterns will be due criminal justice work. quantitative data to dig into the priorities also include authoritarian political policing it. i think there's a broader sense of strategic significance that such as stability maintenance and protests. does encompass strategic

of the mps is a core part of the apparatus serving the parties locations along lines of main tools and power and social order. they also have an international communications. some of that is kind of a baked mandate to organize exchanges in. there is a bureaucratic and collaborate with international police and security apparatuses. the scope of the international activities can be divided into tendency. three categories number one let's say you're the europe office for international unilateral actions including transnational oppression and collaboration. i've got all these eurasian campaigns. number two bilateral engagements countries and maybe am going to including bilateral meetings, formal agreements, capacity focus my attention on the ones that are more powerful, more building material assistance and important, more strategic. extraterritorial joy to and i want to do something with engagement including the everybody. i think there are things that creation of new international institutions and activities of happen to fill out the dance established bodies. the global efforts for the card if it were that do not significant challenges to the united states and other liberal necessarily have a lot of economic significance or democracies such as the national strategic significance. operation such as kidnapping and threatening individuals abroad it operates under the ccp definition of the rule of law which the department and we struggle to find significant established norms simultaneously relationships because some of it is that bureaucratic i've got to eroding the shared recognition

while creating the pretext for the wide-ranging authority and do something with everybody in my portfolio and the finally the behaviors may significance washes out. quickly beat that analysis that encourage other authoritarian regimes in similar ways. identifies the critical input in times of unilateral action, that china has identified the they play a key role in the ccp's ongoing campaign most need for in business and notably through rendition campaigns collaboration fox fund manufacturing like lithium, cobalt or oil and then charted, to locate those that flit mapped those critical inputs overseas. they've also used the campaigns with the development of ports for political rivals and to eliminate the foreign these military relationships. intelligence risks. for me anecdotally it's evident evidence confirms operation by the look at sudan, south missions have been conducted on u.s. soil or agents of coerced africa, turkey, kazakhstan. u.s. citizens. in terms of bilateral and there's a pattern to building multilateral engagement, the foreign counterparts forge out military afghanistan for stronger relationships with example recently. institutions building their reputation as a credible security partner. of 114 identified bilateral exchanges over half of which >> yes but again the quantitative studies it doesn't have occurred under the really come through. president's tenure where it comes through his un

peace keeping and south sudan missions. they tried to govern the south organization with sudan one and ways that would protect chinese oil investments counterterrorism matters other there. topics in the meetings included the un pushed back and did not transnational crime, law look them do what they want. enforcement cooperation and capacity building and border >> eventually they push back. security. topics such as maintaining >> yes, yes. stability and 41 different you are right these are drivers. bilateral meetings with officials in 18 different my point is when you try countries. they assigned at least 51 district and a backtracked occult to statistical analysis we try to do that requested agreements between 1995 and strict contents. 2020. there's a potential for downstream effects with human >> i would just add to that, rights for example in june of most of what i have looked up as 2017 there was the signing of china's approach to military the cooperation with the relations with countries which ministry of interior to address the economic perceive that. the spread of tigger and ideology and weeks later there but i will say there are were more than 200 degrees linick in egypt a step that came different reasons why they have in response from beijing. security presence in different countries you mentioned they also direct capacity building opportunities such as afghanistan. training sessions to partner there is a lot of interest in security institutions across the stability and central asia and

globe and of the 77 sessions identified the governments central countries. received the most with about 40% one of the reasons it's hard to and african governments receive the share of 35% and mps from quantify these types of engagement in this way the ten different countries on stability maintenance topics. difficult question. increasingly they offer cyber technology topics including electronic data forensics and artificial intelligence. >> yes. as a variation on what from 2006 to 2021 they provided commissioner cleaver just asked britt we have her hearing on china and latin america people material assistance the really emphasized this whole of different countries and government approach the ccp different occasions they range from computers, police equipment uses. so i find myself wondering they to the construction of facilities for partner security will tap into something when institutions and the provision they want to close a deal. of the related. are there examples of part of they also connect bilateral what they are doing is we will give you military training or we controls with police officers in will some sort of a military croatia, italy and between 2016 engagement and that is what is and 2019 according to the chinese news sources they are to being used to accomplish something else. protect tourists and citizens there might be economics they during the height of the season and in terms of the multilateral contact into all these different engagement in 2015 there was the resources. international institution for i am presuming military engagement or military training stronger relationships abroad.

exercises something like that is on the tools they can use. this combines convenience police are there examples where that's and security sector officials happening? it's the same problem how do you from 30 to 40 countries annually. most recently 2020. participants enter the regime's quantify something like that? >> what we see let's say they're and host police equipment expos doing a strategic partnership. in the process of negotiating to offer business opportunities you think about all the things to domestic security firms and you can do going to have this partnership agreement. feature products like video going to have a joint statement surveillance, processing drones, facial recognition, saying all the great things we are going to do. technologies, armored vehicles and weapons. the military security it also engages in an existing cooperation is one of those multilateral institution. while it's forbidden under the lines of effort in supporting overall chinese diplomacy yes constitution from undertaking any intervention in the political military religious or this country is a priority for china what can we do in our lane racial character beijing and the to support that. mps violated the role pursuing the dissidents and the notice bearing the true investigative i am pressed to find specific quid pro quo's. purposes of the institution. in the policy recommendations there are things you can point the court object of to addressing the role in the to where they agreed to take more students in chinese foreign policy should be the

military academies horton to counter willingness and ability specific things like that. to conduct activities abroad it does not seem to be a big enough payoff to make the whole thing go. with the norms on security sector governance and at the it seems to be a little piece of same time the u.s. must address the fact certain circumstances the broader line of effort to in the demands from countries improve the relationship with the country, and not usually that share the authoritarian that i can think of the critical values to protect the interest one that turns a no into a yes. the congress should counter the >> as part of the package. oppression while focusing on helping individuals targeted by the institution. they want something to be in that space but it does not seem to be the critical part of the package. >> a good example of this is china's approach to relations with africa. african countries were that's pressing for increased where you see that it serves as transparency and partner governments the first step should include mandating the a building block approach economic interest foreign policy congressional report on the activities. thank you. interest and other joint security cooperation with a number of african nations. >> thank you for your again it sorted something that statements. fellow commissioners, we are going to go and reverse is not purely military to get

alphabetical order. other access. the chair and cochair we thank you. >> commissioner wessel? >> thank you all. bolstered in that case with the vice chair. >> thank you for your testimony i want to ask and maybe mr. link i will ask you to start. and written submissions. i will start with professor i there's been a lot of discussion lately, for several years now for technologies, surveillance, had noticed that your testimony et cetera as both an in and in you mentioned in the areas of study or development you enabling and disabling mentioned a global security technology. can you help me as it relates to initiative and that concept that was put out is amorphous and not overseas surveillance, et cetera how that might be integrated sure what it means but can you into the strategies here? talk a little bit about how you see the military diplomacy fitting into that even >> i guess i would speak to that mostly from the capacity building perspective there've preliminarily given? been times mps is trained other countries and surveillance >> sure. thanks for your question. techniques. again it gets to the export or i think the global security import issue.

it's clear they're willing to initiative notwithstanding the offer up these and other main point is china is countries want them. increasingly using the military as a tool to support its abroad policy goals and part of that is because the pla has the >> it's also a opportunity. capability to be able to do that there's been a lot of concern of now whereas they didn't in the enabling a mideast country to do past. the other part of it is i think surveillance. that it's the intent of the is there a sharing of that military diplomacy and that is surveillance and data? to gain access to build or access to it that has been discussed that might be enabling relations, to build a network of partners that will feed into the capabilities? economic goals and foreign >> i don't know. policy goals. >> any of the other witnesses? the global security initiative is kind of amorphous. maybe doctor saunders can >> i've done a little research explain it better but i think at on the export of chinese this point there aren't a lot of surveillance technology. details right now in the public i would just say china along the domain but the broader point is the military diplomacy will stability operations or whatever continue to feed into that and support some of those foreign you rule the term, stability and maintenance the chinese are policy goals. >> anything to add?

providing the leaders of certain governments with the ability to then broadly surveilled into the >> not a lot of specifically but this is a pattern you see narrative in the actual practice sometimes. the leadership will endorse a of it. concept everybody in the >> okay, thank you. bureaucracy tries to figure out how can we shape this and put >> commissioner? our stuff inside it and i think >> sorry. it's one of the actors trying to i thought there is somewhat ahead of me. do that. we have all these capabilities mr. link, thank you for your and things we want to do. testimony pretty want to pressure bit on your how do we get a concept like the recommendation there taps here illegally and maybe i should global security initiative read more closely some of the that's endorsed and then we get more resources and credit for papers you cite. i was just thinking about this. doing so. i don't have a lot to say i kind of see here not even that specifically because i think it is very much a work in progress. >> so we don't quite know and creative prosecutor can find they don't know. ways to get out the spirit was a second, reading some of the recommendations from all of you you talk about limiting the violation of terms of visas or mps officers are here you can negative effects on u.s. twisted into propaganda work. interest from expanded cooperation and exercises and weapons sales, training. there are violations on municipal their state level they it strikes me and tell me if i'm are extorting people with wrong looking at the long-term threats to their family, if it's

as china expands its presence surveillance of data breaches. and relationships across the world yes there is a threat. there are laws in the books it seems to me for prosecutor wanted to go after this they could. but put that aside. in the short term it sounds like that's the first question are the truly legal gaps. >> work the second question the main concern for the u.s. is should this be a legal matter that it will complicate our for their better way to get applets in a more clean fashion alliance relationships either compromising or from an is treated as a ci and intelligence perspective the intelligence matter. training methods or doctrines, we both intelligence operations technology or perhaps the fact in the u.s. we don't like by the chinese have even a small expelling png and other methods we use and elevating it to be a foothold that will then make political matter we have to them more reluctant to give us bring this up in political dialogue at multiple levels to the highest level instead of trying to pick at this minutely through law enforcement. the access. are there really legal gaps is question number two question number two is this the best way that complicates the from the to get at it should be more cim political? >> could i just added think that's really important the way we treated the soviets in terms

chinese. >> i think that's right. of where they were allowed to if you take something like the travel how close they could get pacific island for example where to military basis emphasizing china has worked on building the ci approach. >> think of the questions will influence in a variety of areas start the second one first were it seems we need a more holistic economically, they worked on approach and drink both concurrently at the same time building influence. given the number of cases of that's an area where the u.s. operation we seen in the u.s. has not until recently focused a i think that would make sense lot of our security engagement for in terms of the legal gaps for my research process speaking as well as foreign policy efforts on that area so they to some of the folks that are look for areas like that where they can sort of gain advantage involved in actually charging these people and things like that. they were the ones it told me where they were not paying as they were legal gaps for think a much attention but also where lot of other research indicates there's strategic locations that they might be able to take the research should be outlawed advantage of, so i think it is as a term of art or what ever. sort of a two-part thing. that would probably just help a lot in these situations. >> with u.s. allies and partners we have a very good a security >> thank you. relationship and robust and if they compare what they are i think we have three minutes i getting from china and from us, have a question i don't think it but the dialogue with china is would lend itself to quick

answers. and with us, it is entirely maybe if you would be willing i different much more substantive could follow-up for the record. in the relations with the u.s. so simply doing things with china it's because they want to learn about or manage the relationship and to help may be raised the game and know how they operate and how to protect yourself and protect the things we taught you for the developing countries they are looking for any kind of training and assistance so it's a very different dynamic. >> commissioner price, welcome. >> thank you all for participating today. your testimony has been very helpful. following up on what was just

asked, how in your opinion should the policymakers weigh the costs and benefits of engagement with the security forces? >> one part of it is to do no harm, but we want to be careful what we do and what we talked to them about and what we show them. generally in my experience i've been with the department since 2004 i've seen a pretty careful effort to vent what we do and exercise positive control so that's one piece but the second is to think what is the positive agenda. we are in a relationship with china that would be good to have better crisis management and crisis communication mechanisms to deal with the problems that come up and we would be better to have an understanding how they are thinking about the world and what are the threat

perceptions. these provide a window and you have to be disciplined and prepared but if you know the right questions to ask and ask in a disciplined way, you can learn a lot from engaging the pla. part of our job is to do research on that. we've done a number of books including on the reforms, and i can say our ability to meet with them and understand why they are doing what they are doing offered a lot of really valuable insight. part of it is being in a disciplined and focused engagement to know what you want to learn and ask and protect and do so in a disciplined way. i think that kind of preparation, some things we know we don't want to talk or to help them modernize their military or improve the joint operations capabilities and they said we

would like to do exercises with you on traditional security. we want to learn from you but you won't do it with us so we have no choice but to go to the russians. we want to learn from you but you're not going to let us do that. >> i would add i agree with everything doctor saunders said but the political aspect for the countries in the region for bolstering relations with china in certain ways they are part and parcel of other engagements that countries in the region have with china. i think more about education about the objectives china is pursuing and u.s. interest.

>> your presentation and to focuson the public securities activities are very interesting and helpful. have you observed any recent efforts by the u.s. or allies to better assist the overseas presence and potentially respond to their activities with overseas police stations et cetera? it's very much part of your recommendation, so i don't know where that -- >> we've seen the fbi and other folks reach press conferences and things going light to the fox hunt and open ocean and things of that nature but in terms of the other types of engagements, not really but also it's not my specific research

focus here. i might have missed it but i don't think i've seen it. >> those are my questions for now. >> commissioner. >> thank you. .. philip saunders testified the types of things the poa does. and then it sounded like in many cases, like what we do. high-level diplomacy, disaster relief court calls and so on.

so i asked this open ended, is there something different? or is it very much like what we do? >> two things. partly they're watching what we do and modeled somewhat what we do. a lot of the lines of effort are paralleled formally. there's a lot of difference and the content. you have a high level meeting with the u.s. military officer. you're going to get a pretty frank assessment pretty good statement of u.s. policy. it is the start of a relationship will try to follow up on a bill that was part of military officers get to be senior military officers is by building and maintaining those relationships. if you have a similar meeting with the pla officer stick to their talking points. they're not going to be able to follow up off-line out of official channels. it is probably a one and done.

trying to engage with them or for their duration. they make one trip overseas a year. they're going to give a departing client and the talking points are not moved from that. those are well may be lies or exaggerated falsehoods. you come out of the meeting not having built any trust or relationship but learned with the chinese talking points are. at least in my experience you come away with the more negative impression to start with. that's part they are under politically controls that inhibit what they do. i think similarly with a lot of training will all speak to military education that is the area i know best. when the pla brings students they have a separate campus. they have a separate program. they sometimes will have pla

officers they are participating in the class. it is a stage manage done for foreigners for the u.s. brings forward students into our military education schools they are essentially getting the same kind of training there in the same classes with them learn the same curriculum. they come away with a much deeper understanding of the subject u.s. counterparts that in many cases last for decades. at the qualitative experience love these things are similar in form but you look at the content and dialogues in high level meetings and educational sessions the very much different. in operability.

just to piggyback on those comments the breath of u.s. security and engagement in the pla's. at the capabilities they have not had the capabilities to do some of the things until relatively recently. i think it is also to doctor saunders points of intent. for foreign militaries their anecdotes we are happy to have pla come and train us and help us with our training. we don't think they're that great compared to other countries trainings. [laughter] you could find anecdotes like the perth and also the political

aspects which is quite different from the u.s. military. i was trained pla been trained by the u.s. to get their views on what are the strengths and weaknesses about u.s. does it one of the weaknesses about china does it. many of into those courses. she got one question and if you'd like a second round i think we can find time. commissioner goodwin? >> thank you mr. chapin my appreciation to the witnesses for your time today. both the reference of a diplomatic activity the pla engages in in the gulf and how

it's designed to help gain critical expertise in protecting lines of communication. but also designed to help energy security. my question is have we seen any trends or an uptick in this sort of outreach invasion of ukraine geared towards protecting energy security? >> that is a great question. i think the answer is i haven't really seen that. the bigger impact has been coded. what used to happen is the pla would send two or three ships out to the gulf of aden for about four months. they would read fuel and then on the way back they would pick four or five port calls and do various engagements with foreign militaries on the way back. that serves some of the purposes talked about in terms of building ties.

what happens in the covid environment they made the last of the sport calls in march of 2000. now they finish their deployment and sale straight home for they're not doing those kinds of things. even when they need to supply their doing it from djibouti. they are loading food and china shrink wrapping it offloads the pla ships. very little interaction with the host government or not. i think covid has really curtailed a lot of that in their ability to do some these military engagements for the protection. there soaking the operational experience in terms of crews and commanders out there doing operational things which is part of the benefit to them. covid knock them off the game.

click some of the nontraditional security operations is again meant to support china in building relationships to its energy resources. son exactly what you're talking about but against the intent of the diplomacy activities and non- security something i'm very concerned about for a long time now. >> mr. link i had a question about the red notices. that in and of itself are not arrest warrants is but that request to detain individuals pending extradition based upon in order what is the extent of interposed review of these requests with compliance all of the requirements but most notably most unconstitutional.

>> for my research it sounds like the review process is underfunded. within interval the settlement request to go through it on the proper screening mechanisms are people to the screening mechanisms. they often times go through a number in the situation we are and now her quickset may answer my next question is any publicly available data on red notices requested? whether they are granted, denied or rejected? >> that is another issue non- transparent. total number of red notices i don't it's broken down by year i don't think it's broken down by country publicly at least. >> you reference the fact violating article three many

formal mechanisms in the red notice of process for opposing consequences parts i don't know off the top of my head i don't think so. thank you. text thank you very much and thanks to all of our witnesses. i like to start with doctor saunders. able to decline in 2015. what was the reason for that? is it primarily instigation or hours? >> heard testimony it is intensified a lot of the decline

the u.s. side being more careful and disciplined and screening what kind of activities we need to go forward. the extraneous factor for the pla reforms have kicked in all the things they need to do to put those reforms and place and generally had less time for diplomacy. for general phenomenon. how the pla used utility of these contacts with the united states? >> they viewed them as a useful means of presenting their talking points of what u.s. thinking is and what the united states is up too. i hope to use his military relationship to improve their modernization and improve their combat capability.

i think we have been pretty disciplined and trying to make sure to do that. there is a prestige part of it dealing directly with the u.s., the most powerful country in the world makes china look good. and sometimes have particular pieces of business they want to get done. they want to press the u.s. to limit its reconnaissance operation for they went toward the u.s. against doing things against taiwan. and at times they been willing to pursue specific kinds of cooperation such as the rules of engagement encounters when they find that in their interest. and that case they were told to do it by shooting pain according to several tiny sources that i have talked too. the directive came down from the top. partly to use as a means of managing the relationship with the united states and specifically choose the

confidence building measures to try to improve relations with the u.s. >> thank you very much. i like to ask you to speculate. i know that's not quite fair. if you had to guess looking had five -- 10 years what would you expect the overall shape and intensity look like what are the next steps' power. >> that's a great question. speaks to the broader question clearly they want to build a military with global projections of some sort. i think how large that will be

some open ended question. in order to build the kind of military they would need a much bigger of allies and partners. they would need a lot of investments. the major strategic direction of the military is still regional, taiwan the regional i do think with all of that says china will have, will continue to expand its overseas military diplomacy both for economic interest but to gain access. i do think they will probably continue to expand some of the areas that was small security footprints in those areas might

be a latin america for example or the strategic operates of space station right now. so i think we will see a lot more of that. i think we will see the navy in particular doing more port calls. going out and about market with that said i do want to emphasize the deployments oversee are pretty limited and small. too actually grow those would require a lot more investments than they are currently doing. >> thank you. >> commissioner? >> thank you. thank you to the witnesses. like to hear all of you say the meetings themselves they might not be all that productive. their long lectures and neatly pointing how that's improving relations.

i thought might be the only ones of it sounds like you concur. think about these questions with russia and iran i think he talked about exercises, maybe mrs. saunders associate for the south korean set up military hotlines with air and naval with northern command. the deputy commander in south korea is talk about my first question is gained in these joint exercises and giving your comments south korea is an ally. what are we taking away their participation in these exercises?

>> give a preliminary answer this is an area we are researching right now. to speak to the ironic piece the pla has been very careful in its relations with iran for a long time they did not do much military activity and they did not exercise. the difference was the nuclear deal. that in their view legitimized ironic as a legitimate partner to do things with. and from that point economic and military engagement picked up. that is the first point with a run for the exercises don't not seen that substantive. the exercises with the russia are much more substantive. definitely it's a pla goal to learn from the russians. learn how they do things. also a goal to build interoperability between the two militaries. we are doing a research project right now that is coming up with the metrics to look at each of those exercises, what is the military significance? what is the political signaling

value and to look for trends over time. think the preliminary thing we see is that there is an uptick in 2014/2015 for it accelerates in terms of the sophistication, the scale of the exercise, the types of things there drove with russia. a new thing over the last three years are various kinds of joint patrols. joint naval patrols, joint air patrols with bomber sets a new element that has just happened. do not do so think there's that much interoperability being built through those things but the point is to signal a strategic willingness of the two countries in the two militaries to cooperate. we doing more work on that hopeo have details on that. the final question you asked was about the rock hotlines. this started out in the wake of a near miss when there is incidents when i believe and iraq airliners was almost shot

down. iraq was understandably very upset they want to have wasted talked to the pla initially is with the air force and navy headquarters. after the reform that has moved to be that northern theater command navy component headquarters. in the air force headquarters. it is unclear to me how well those are used for and how effective they are. we have pitched a project to our korean counterparts to examine that issue. there is a little reluctance to go there unfortunately. but that is an interesting area. the broader recommendation, i think there is value and engaging our allies and partners about these kinds of things for that is the kind of think we can talk about. how is your outline working question after they pick up what is the best practice here and are you doing things working more effectively than us or vice

versa? how do we best coordinate our approaches? >> if you could build on that with your testimony about the exercises that involve nato. and europe and pla. and i think you noted you assisted the pla and operational learning. i'm curious what we learned? >> 40 think we learn progress they actually did learn quite a bit from operated with the foreign navies at that time. i don't think that would necessarily be the case nowadays because they're just more practice at it. in terms of what we learned, i think we did learn a bit in terms of do or not do command-and-control? >> that was one of the major points we learned.

the event working on reforming that. that hierarchy with command and control and fostering the ability of commanders in the field to make their own independent decisions is something that pla has written about extensively as an issue and a challenge. it's part of what the reform efforts have been deemed at fixing. beck's first let me say thank you very much. i'm very, very happy to learn today the depths you are going to, to follow this military diplomacy question. and the message i got from all of this is clearly like everything is in their country,

there is a very vertical management scheme. so i am curious but i want to reiterate what you said and that i have a question for doctor saunders and probably also for you, mr. lincoln. and please jump in. if i understand it correctly the office of the central military commission at the office of international military directly under it they report to the defense minister to sheeting paying. the fellow who was the ambassador of china, i hope i said that correctly, known as a wolf warrior spent a lot of time bashing us this year end the year before. also spent a tremendous amount of time and our country visiting with governors, mayors and local localities and business leaders,

becoming friends. in a great sense i'm learning that the form of military diplomacy. he has now been appointed the foreign affairs minister. and doctor saunders, in your testimony you mentioned there is a seat on the foreign affairs commission derive from the dement defense minister which goes straight down the line. i'm curious first you see his appointment which was only a few weeks ago, changing anything or enhancing anything they're already doing? and secondly, i am curious about the msp i apologize for that comment state report up to the same structure? do they also have a seat at the foreign affairs commission? is there a simple tran there if you see a change because of the change in foreign affairs

commission? >> it will be concise because i don't have a good answer. but what i would say is what matters is the part you work in the central foreign affairs commission. that is the decision-makers. the foreign minister has a voice and that he is a member of that, participates in those discussions and goes on to execute what the commission decides. it is an important position that it is eight party position. so one that makes the decisions and issues with guidance. looks good to know. >> i honestly don't know the answer to that question for it is a great question printer ports more to the legal apparatus rather than foreign affairs request you don't have a specific coordination between the two different arms of this military diplomacy? eventually all focuses on one man. but that is good to know they have not coordinated, go ahead. >> i would just say i look at

this i did a search of pla writings to see if there's anything specifically the pla coordinate that industry affairs and did not find much of anything. >> that is news today, thank you. >> out is a flag in the don't know that much about which is the national security commission which is a new organization set up in 2014 it's supposed to pay some sort of information sharing policy coordination role. we know it has civilians we know it has for ministry people. it has a military people. likely almost certainly has public security people on it. but it is a little bit of a black box trying to understand how much is a policy making how much of it is a coordination? how much of it is information sharing?

it seems to be at least partly a control mechanism. my colleague looked into this and found this is a structure that's replicated not just at the center but at the providences and lower levels with at least part of the goal of keeping everybody on the same page and following sheeting things and guidance on security. but that is an area where this kind of coordination might be taking place. but we don't know enough about what he does is very little reporting on his activities. >> thank you very much. ask madam chair? >> thanks very much thanks to all of our witnesses. again arts are kick off hearing this is a great way to frame a lot of issues moving forward. mr. lincoln, it is really, really difficult to hear about these exercises the activities without being outraged. i want to also really acknowledge the work of the ngo

for their recent exposé of what has been happening with the police stations. i find myself wondering in country after country did the powers not know what was going on? did they see what was going on and ignore it? it's pretty alarming to hear this chinese police stations functioning in cities across the united states for example at what they are doing in terms of outreach against dissidents or things like that. was there a brightness or people just did not see it? >> thank you for the question. this is purely speculation on my part. part of it could be a language barrier a lot of signs were posted in chinese and most people in america don't speak chinese they would not understand is that chinese police station there is that. the jury is still a little bit out about the true purpose of the stations are. there are reports a suburb of

paris some is operating from one of the stations and harass someone to return to china. there is also been work it's more of an administrative type deal to renew drivers licenses and things like that. think we need more evidence still. we recently saw a fbi raid in new york city looking to you that partner just would have to wait until we have details on the application. >> following up on commission or cleveland's questions about china, russia, i wrong i also want to expand it to exercises at china, russia, south africa exercises taking place. we know about this between china and russia. in terms of the contracts of military diplomacy if there is coordination be on the exercises in terms of where they might be focusing what they might try to

achieve presenting evidence is a broader coordination i am not at all minimizing the consequences of exercises is an ongoing relationship building that's part of all this military diplomacy, china, russia, and everywhere else? >> it's a little bit of what i