China Is Winning the Global Power Shift — America Is Running Out of Options | Silk and Steel

**David Oualaalou** (0:00)
Our guest today, none other than Carl Zha, will argue that the US isn't just losing ground, it might be completely locked out. So let's find out, and let me bring my dear friend, Carl.
Hi Carl.

**Carl Zha** (0:16)
Hi David.

**David Oualaalou** (0:17)
Good to see you man. As always to those who might be here for the first time, if you don't know Carl, he is the host of the Silk and Steel Podcast. I highly recommend you to go and listen and watch that. It's about the history because it focuses on the history, the culture, China and politics. All in one setting. So and China, I mean, Carl has been doing this for quite a while. So I highly, highly recommend it for you. All right, Carl, we're going to have to, there's a lot to cover by the way. So I'm going to want to start with what's going on now with the negotiations between Bangladesh and China regarding the former Bangladesh wanted to buy 20 Chinese Chengdu J-10C.
What is this all about?

**Carl Zha** (1:12)
Well, I mean, they had a demo. They have a pretty good demo last year when Pakistan's Air Force used China's J-10C to shoot down India's Rafale jets, which are very good French jets, by the way. But J-10C apparently performed better. And now, that was really the best marketing for China's J-10C on the world market. Now, not only Pakistan has them, Uzbekistan also unveiled their fleet of J-10C, which they took delivery last year.
And now, Bangladesh is joining the club. Now, there's a pattern here. All these countries are neighbors of India. They're all surrounding India.

**David Oualaalou** (2:01)
We know what it means. We know what it means.

**Carl Zha** (2:06)
Well, I mean, because India had double down our purchasing of the French Rapal Jets. So, the Indian's neighbors are like, okay, well, we'll just get J-10C then. We know how to deal with that problem.
The Chinese product, the Chinese jet included, they are very good for their money. The amount of money that India could use to purchase the Rafale program, you could procure multiple times of J-10C. This is why these other countries are choosing them right now.

**David Oualaalou** (2:48)
Well, that's true because I also know that the Chinese will not sell the J-20 stealth fighters. Those are very advanced.
And I can understand why, because it's technology that is not sort of available to everybody. And I can see why. But the fact, like you mentioned earlier, that China, that India's neighbors are purchasing the Chinese weapons, it tells you as to where China is headed regarding the South China Sea, the Southeast Asia, I'm sorry. So will it be fair to say, Carl, that now we can conclusively state that China is now the dominant arms supplier in India's neighboring countries?

**Carl Zha** (3:38)
Well, I mean, right now, the biggest top three, the biggest top two still US and Russia, right? But China is starting to close in ranks. China is still a distant third compared to the numbers that the United States and Russia are racking up. But now more people are paying attention to the Chinese weaponry. And the trend will likely to continue.
For example, the Rafale system that was sold to India, the French, they held back. They didn't give the most advanced version, which is normal. And also, they didn't give the India the most advanced missile to go along with Rafale, the Meteor missile. But Pakistan did receive a pretty good variant of the PL series. And as it's been proven, Pakistan was able to use the J-10C to shoot down Rafale outside of the visual range. Meaning these two aircraft never, the pilots never saw each other. They only saw a blip on the radar and they pressed the button and it hit. And that's a reality of the modern air warfare.
The top gong, that's for Hollywood, that's for movies. It's not gonna be dogfight with like F-18s, right? I mean, it's just not, a lot of the fight will be decided before the airplanes even come into visual range of each other.

**David Oualaalou** (5:18)
Yeah. Well, you're absolutely correct because I'm gonna disclose this one here. I had just completed my book about China and I devoted an entire section onto the military capabilities for the Chinese. And I am not talking on the top of my head. I conducted the research for the last two years. So, where they are as far as the capabilities and what is the advantage that I see the Chinese have has to do with the cost. You know, this fighter jets, they're not gonna cost $80 million.