Not when it comes to national security issues, particularly defense.
When the Soviets collapsed, China lost the only source of defense related technologies. Even worse, the former Soviet satellites sold US a still secret amount of Soviet defense hardware. They needed cash to keep their countries going. They called US and we painted black a still secret amount of transport vehicles, from ships to trucks to aircrafts, to go shopping. When I was stationed at MacDill in a previous life, there were a few nights when we were ordered to go inside the squadron building, close all doors and windows, and no one was allowed to leave for a couple hrs. Then we heard the distinctive whine of C-5 Galaxy engines and wondered WTF was going on. Years later it was revealed that we bought tanks, fighters, computers, chunks of fissionable grade uranium, and even ICBMs from these former Soviet satellites. So now not only did China lost the only source of defense related hardware, whatever China bought from the Soviets stopped being mysteries to US.
China effectively was defenseless.
That vulnerability was not completely realized among the PLA's top leadership. Most of them were still thinking in the Korean War mindset, mirrored here by the Chinese members as how often they brought that up as 'proof' that China 'defeated' the US. Laughable an argument as it is. When Desert Storm came around, the PLA predicted that even though the US led alliance would win, the US military being the bulk of the offensive will pay the heaviest price for that victory, something close to the Vietnam War casualty figures.
We know how that turned out...Do we?
Finally, China's defenseless status sunk into the thick skulls of the PLA's leadership. They stood in front of the Politburo with eggs on their faces trying to explain why their predictions were so egregiously wrong. Many, if not most, of the Politburo have revolutionary backgrounds. Some even marched with Mao at his lowest hours. They knew what war involves. All the medals festooned on the generals' uniforms instantly became either ebay baubles or toys inside those arcade parlor machines. A US Marine's rifleman badge awarded at the end of Basic is worth more than all the medals worn by a PLA general. It turned out a US Army captain was a better practitioner of Sun Tzu than a PLA general. Not just Sun Tzu but also Von Clausewitz.
Reform was inevitable. Not just in hardware but also in intellect. China had no choice but to resort to thievery in order to modernize the PLA quickly. Not just the PLA but also in everything else. Modern capitalism and its institutions and methods were adopted. Marx and Mao must be spinning in their tombs. At least Marx because Mao is pickled in an oversized jar for the public to gawk at during daylight hours, but he probably spins at night when no one is around to see his distress. The price of access to low cost Chinese labor will be one's own intellectual and physical achievements. Ethics be damned -- on both sides.
Sounds like someone just came out of their primary school history class and has no idea about how the Cold War went.
Soviet Union? Selling and supplying defence technology to China during the Sino Soviet split?
Does gambit have any idea where China obtained its defense technology or why an arms embargo was placed on China after Tiananmen square? Your hero in the White House who said "tear down this wall" sold defense technology to China, not the guy with the pot-wine stain on his head.
China doesn't care where the defense technology originates. It has been reverse engineering weapons ever since it captured breach loading cannons from the Portuguese in 1522, and quickly duplicated them. China used inferior cannon technology to first defeat the Portuguese with their advanced weapons and reverse engineer the Portuguese ones. It began using the Portuguese cannon in battle.
Portuguese at Macau were also used by the Ming again to manufacture new cannon to fight the Qing. They were successfuly at defeating the Qing at the Battle of Ningyuan and killing their leader Nurhaci. However the Qing captured some of the Portuguese cannon and replicated more on their own.
After the Dutch were defeated in Taiwan in 1662 by Ming Chinese loyalists, the captured Dutch cannon were reversed engineered and reused against other enemies.
The Qing used Jesuits to manufacture even newer types of cannon and these were used to defeat the Russians at the Battle of Albazin.
During the 19th century many arsenals were built by the Qing throughout the country and equipment brought from western countries to reverse engineer and manufacture western style weapons en masse. Repeater rifles, bullets, artillery shells, mortars, artillery and machine guns were made. The only problem lied in the artillery shells and not anything else, because corrupt officials would fill the shells with non explosive material.
Technology doesn't always win battles. A bunch of tribal aboriginals wielding spears and muzzle loading muskets first slaughtered an entire crew of American sailors in the Rover Incident and then clobbered and humiliated a following American military expedition in 1867.
The French were defeated in their attempt to capture Taiwan in the Keelung campaign. Mind you, this was with the Chinese army using outdated Dutch and Spanish colonial era muzzle loading cannon and non exploding artillery shells against the French's fully functioning explosive artillery and modern equipment. The spear wielding aboriginals again inflicted defeat on the French and chopped their heads off to be put on display.
In the Boxer Rebellion, the Imperial army was armed with repeating rifles, machine guns, mines, and artillery thanks to reverse engineering of western arms and then mass producing them at arsenals in China. Thanks to this the Eight Nation Alliance suffered alot of casualties
The force besieging the legations was equipped with German originated krupp artillery and could have leveled the legations had their not been deliberately ordered to hold back. Chinese artillery managed to kill 172 allied forces on their ships at Dagu forts. The Allies were attacked by Imperial army forces with repeating rifles and artillery in the Seymour Expedition and were defeated and driven back with heavy casulaties. The allies suffered heavily from Chinese sniping and artillery at the Battle of Tienstin. The American officer commanding the 9th infantry regiment and the flag bearer were both killed and many were shot by the snipers. At the Battle of Yangcun and Battle of Beicang Chinese forces inflicted heavy casualties upon the Allies for such brief battles and the Allies casualties at Beicang were higher than the Chinese. Dozens of allies were killed at Beijing by Chinese rifle fire. Most casualties were inflicted upon the Japanese.
Do you think any of those allied soldiers who were killed or wounded screamed "its not fair, you stole the technology!" before they passed on to the afterlife?
