CMSI routinely produces multimedia content that complements its publications, explores new avenues of inquiry, and provides additional analytical insight into China’s military maritime developments.
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Issues in National Security 2026-2027 Lecture 1: "Toppling Trees, Flourishing Forest, Why the PLA Navy Advances Despite Corruption-Related Removals"
Andrew Erickson
This lecture examines an apparent paradox in Xi Jinping’s military modernization: even as unprecedented purges remove senior officers and defense-industry leaders, China’s military—and particularly its navy—continues to expand and improve at a formidable pace. Using a “forest and trees” metaphor, the presentation argues that analysts risk mistaking extraordinary personnel turbulence for institutional paralysis.
While leadership removals expose persistent corruption and political dysfunction, China retains deep reservoirs of personnel, industrial capacity, technology, infrastructure, and state-directed resources. The PLA continues to field increasingly sophisticated capabilities, improve training realism and joint integration, expand production capacity, and sustain a growing operational tempo. These trends are particularly significant in the maritime domain and around Taiwan, where increasingly complex exercises rehearse coercion, blockade, precision-strike, and invasion-related capabilities.
The lecture assesses China’s military trajectory through measurable outputs and operational behavior rather than leadership turnover alone. Its central conclusion is that corruption and repeated removals represent important vulnerabilities, but should not be assumed to derail China’s military buildup.
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Issues in National Security 2025-2026 Lecture 3: Operation Causeway
Ian Easton
Did you know the United States almost invaded Taiwan in World War II? Had it gone forward, Operation Causeway would have rivaled the Normandy D-Day landings in scale and complexity. And it would have been the largest combined air-sea-land engagement in world history.
Lecture 3: Operation Causeway: Taiwan's Wartime History and Implications for the Current Strategic Environment. In this lecture, Professor Ian Easton tells the untold story of U.S. plans and preparations to invade Taiwan in early 1945, examines why the operation was called off, and explores the enduring lessons of history for the defense of Taiwan in the current strategic context.
Easton is an associate professor in the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute and is the author of "The Final Struggle: Inside China’s Global Strategy" and "The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan's Defense and American Strategy in Asia." He previously served as a senior director at the Project 2049 Institute in Virginia and a visiting fellow at the Japan Institute for International Affairs in Tokyo. He holds an M.A. in China Studies from National Chengchi University in Taiwan and a B.A. in International Studies from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He studied Mandarin Chinese at Fudan University in Shanghai and National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei.
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Issues in National Security 2024-2025 Lecture 3: China's Naval Expansion
Christopher Sharman
This Issues in National Security Lecture took place on February 11, 2025. The views presented by the faculty or other guest speakers do not reflect official positions of the Naval War College, DON or DOD.
Synopsis: This lecture addresses how China is building toward developing a "world class" navy. There are multiple ways to measure a “world-class” navy; what matters most are China’s own criteria informing its efforts toward that end. Capabilities-based benchmarks are a widespread measure of a navy’s level; PLA leadership appears focused on developing the capabilities that improve the PLAN’s proficiency to execute specified missions at the operational level of war.
President Xi seeks for his navy to surpass U.S.-level capabilities regarding PRC policy priorities by pursuing novel technological and developmental pathways to becoming the world’s most capable navy in these mission sets. China’s 2019 Defense White Paper (DWP) provides a roadmap for these missions.
Only when the PLAN successfully integrates the means required to support the full range of these missions will Beijing perceive it has reached world-class status. By sowing doubt about PLAN capability to execute these missions, Washington can downgrade Party-military leadership perceptions about China’s world-class naval status and instill restraint.
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ONI Recognition guide PLAN CCG, PAFMM
Office of Naval Intelligence
Office of Navel Intelligence 2024 China Coast Guard and Government Maritime Forces Recognition and Identification Guide.
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ONI Recognition Guide: PLAN Coast Guard
Office of Naval Intelligence
Office of Naval Intelligence 2022-23 People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Coast Guard, and Government Maritime Forces Recognition and Identification Guide
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CMSI Conference Interview 1: John Richardson
Andrew S. Erickson
Conversation with Adm. John Richardson from the 2023 CMSI Conference "Chinese Undersea Warfare: Development, Capabilities, Trends."
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CMSI Conference Interview 2: Sara Kirchberger
Andrew S. Erickson
Conversation with Dr. Sara Kirchberger from the 2023 CMSI Conference "Chinese Undersea Warfare: Development, Capabilities, Trends."
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CMSI Conference Interview 3: James Foggo
Andrew S. Erickson
Conversation with Adm. James Foggo from the 2023 CMSI Conference "Chinese Undersea Warfare: Development, Capabilities, Trends."
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CMSI Conference Interview 4: Norman Friedman
Andrew S. Erickson
Conversation with Dr. Norman Friedman from the 2023 CMSI Conference "Chinese Undersea Warfare: Development, Capabilities, Trends."
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PLAN Ship Identification Playing Cards
China Maritime Studies Institute
China Maritime Studies Institute PLAN Ship Idenfication playing cards.
