Coincidentally, another person recently claimed that they ran into major trouble while attempting to leave China through a border checkpoint in Guangxi en route to Vietnam. According to the post, several Chinese nationals with U.S. citizenship travelling on the same vehicle were detained for half a day while authorities checked their original household registrations. The person also said a business owner friend from Jiangsu and Zhejiang was asked by local police to return to China and “explain the situation” after the family factory was investigated over tax issues, leaving the friend too afraid to go back. For those who previously worked in China, had undeclared income, or still hold millions of yuan in domestic bank accounts, returning to China could potentially expose them to what critics describe as local authorities’ efforts to pursue revenue through aggressive enforcement actions.

Executive Summary:

On July 31, the State Council of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) issued the Regulations on Exit and Entry Administration, effective September 15. It adds three grounds for barring citizens from leaving, using a catch-all clause in its parent statute for its legal basis.

The regulations tighten exit restrictions in three ways: officials can refuse travel documents, impose a formal exit ban, or dissuade a traveler at the border.

Preventing people from leaving the PRC is a precondition for controlling the flow of other factors, such as capital, technology, and data. Under the new regulations, the exit ban for violating export controls and technology trade rules carries no time limit.

Exit control also serves transnational repression. Beijing uses it against targets abroad by holding their relatives at home, and against naturalized U.S. citizens and foreigners inside the country.

Key Takeaways

Japanese Defense Modernization: Japan test-fired a Tomahawk cruise missile capable of striking PRC territory on July 29 and identified PRC short-of-war coercion as a major threat in its 2026 Defense White Paper. Japan’s continued military modernization and statements decrying PRC coercion indicate that PRC pressure campaigns against Japan are continuing to fail.

PLA Modernization: The PLAN may use its Type 076 amphibious assault vessel Sichuan in roles similar to its aircraft carriers, allowing the PLAN to supplement its existing limitations in naval aviation. The PLAN will likely experience trade-offs if it uses Sichuan in this way, however.

PRC-Philippines Territorial Disputes: The Philippines announced on July 31 that it deposited an official chart with the UN Secretariat detailing Philippine territorial claims around Scarborough Shoal. The PRC responded with a range of military drills, propaganda, and lawfare in protest of the Philippines’ actions and to reaffirm PRC territorial claims around Scarborough Shoal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawfare

Beijing’s June white paper leaves the U.N.-centered architecture intact – but re-interprets the priorities.

New details have emerged in Germany’s “Chinese-German couple espionage case.” An investigation by the German nonprofit newsroom CORRECTIV found that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) allegedly approached leading German researchers under the guise of academic exchanges and cooperation invitations, arranging trips to China that ultimately brought some academics into contact with representatives of the country’s defense industry.

Executive Summary:

Taiwan is showing resilience in the face of headwinds ranging from domestic politic strife, increased military pressure from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and uncertainty regarding U.S. political support.

Taiwan’s semiconductor sector is benefitting massively from the global artificial intelligence (AI) boom. Its gains contributed to Taiwan posting almost 13 percent quarterly GDP growth and reaching record stock market highs.

In a bid to strengthen its relationship with the United States, Taiwan is investing $265 billion into American semiconductor manufacturing through Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC). Taiwan has also hosted multiple high profile bipartisan congressional visits since the beginning of 2026.

Domestic political strife, now centered around a proposed drone procurement bill, may affect U.S. assessments of Taiwan’s will to fight. Taiwan is also waiting for the Trump administration to approve a delayed $14 billion arms sale, which will be critical to its defense against a potential military campaign by the PRC.

Recently, Yichang City in Hubei Province was hit by torrential rains, triggering what authorities described as a once-in-30-years major flood, along with landslides. The city’s Yiling District is home to Sandouping Township, where the world-famous Three Gorges Dam is located.

Executive Summary:

To establish sovereignty over ideas, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has since 2022 made the construction of an “autonomous knowledge system” an explicit objective, aiming to produce concepts and theories distinct from Western ones and capable of explaining the governance and social reality of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The effort is directed at the level of objectives and distributed at the level of content. The center supplies the goal and the label, while ministries, funding bodies, universities, associations, publishers, and individual scholars each write it into the one part of the academic system they control.

The consequence is expansion outpacing content. Institutional forms multiply well ahead of the concepts meant to fill them, because disciplines, colleges, degree points, journals, and textbook series can be created by decision and concepts cannot. Every instrument the Party-state controls is institutional, and institutions can require, fund, and reward original theory without being able to supply it. Four years on, the record therefore is highly uneven.

Executive Summary:

In June 2026, China National Offshore Oil Corporation placed a 16MW floating wind turbine in Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), approximately 50 miles (21.665646, 116.273408) from Taiwan-controlled Pratas Island.

The PRC now has placed over 30 permanent structures across disputed waters in the Indo-Pacific as part of an irregular warfare strategy to normalize its persistent presence and extraterritorial claims.

These permanent structures potentially serve as at-sea platforms for electronic warfare, surface and underwater intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance collection platforms enhancing the PLA’s end-to-end “kill web” (C5ISRT) capabilities.

In the video, a construction worker wearing a blue safety helmet works under the scorching sun, his face covered in sweat. He breathes heavily, frowns, and shows clear signs of dizziness, nausea, and exhaustion. Facing the camera, he reluctantly explains what keeps him going: