    [Senate Hearing 119-258]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                                                            S. Hrg. 119-258

                        COMBATING THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC
                         OF CHINA'S ILLEGAL, COERCIVE,
                       AGGRESSIVE, AND DECEPTIVE BEHAVIOR
                              IN THE INDO-PACIFIC

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                           SUBCOMMITTEE ON EAST ASIA,
                         THE PACIFIC, AND INTERNATIONAL
                              CYBERSECURITY POLICY

                                     OF THE

                         COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
                              UNITED STATES SENATE

                        ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                                OCTOBER 7, 2025

                                   __________

           Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations

    [GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

                                    __________

                       U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
    62-398 PDF                  WASHINGTON : 2026

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

                     COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS

                    JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho, Chairman
    PETE RICKETTS, Nebraska                JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire
    DAVID MCCORMICK, Pennsylvania          CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware
    STEVE DAINES, Montana                  CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut
    BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee                TIM KAINE, Virginia
    JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming                 JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon
    RAND PAUL, Kentucky                    CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey
    TED CRUZ, Texas                        BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii
    MIKE LEE, Utah                         CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
    RICK SCOTT, Florida                    TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
    JOHN R. CURTIS, Utah                   JACKY ROSEN, Nevada
    JOHN CORNYN, Texas
                 Christopher M. Socha, Staff Director
               Naz Durakoglu, Democratic Staff Director
                       John Dutton, Chief Clerk

                                  (ii)

                             C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page

                                   Statements

    Ricketts, Hon. Pete, Chairman of the subcommittee, U.S. Senator
      from Nebraska..................................................     1

    Coons, Hon. Christopher A., Ranking Member of the subcommittee,
      U.S. Senator from Delaware.....................................     1

                                   Witnesses

    Singleton, Craig, China Program Director and Senior Fellow,
      Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Washington, DC..........     6

        Prepared statement...........................................    29

    Powell, Raymond, Executive Director, Sealight Foundation,
      Stanford, CA...................................................     8

        Prepared statement...........................................    41

    Ratner, Dr. Ely, Principal, The Marathon Initiative, Washington,
      DC.............................................................     9

        Prepared statement...........................................    54

                                     (iii)

         COMBATING THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA'S ILLEGAL, COERCIVE,
             AGGRESSIVE, AND DECEPTIVE BEHAVIOR IN THE INDO-PACIFIC

                                  ----------

                            TUESDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2025

                                   U.S. Senate,
                        Committee on Foreign Relations,
                    Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and
                            International Cybersecurity Policy,
                                                        Washington, DC.

        The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:30 p.m., in
    room SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Pete Ricketts
    presiding.
        Present: Senators Ricketts [presiding], Cornyn, Coons,
    Shaheen, Van Hollen, and Duckworth.

                OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. PETE RICKETTS,
                       U.S. SENATOR FROM NEBRASKA

        Senator Ricketts. This hearing of the Senate Foreign
    Relations Subcommittee on East Asia and the Pacific will come
    to order.
        Before we begin I want to go over a few ground rules. There
    will be zero tolerance for protests or any efforts to
    communicate with witnesses or anybody up here on the dais.
        If you so choose to disrupt this hearing you will be
    arrested immediately and banned from this committee for 1 year.
    We invite the public to attend but we also have important
    business to attend to.
        With that said, we welcome everyone here today and thank
    our witnesses for agreeing to testify. We will begin with an
    opening statement from Senator Coons and then myself, and then
    we will hear from our witnesses.
        Following the testimoney, we will move to a 5-minute round
    of questions. I would like to start by recognizing the ranking
    member for his comments.

                STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER A. COONS,
                       U.S. SENATOR FROM DELAWARE

        Senator Coons. Thank you so much, Senator Ricketts. I am
    grateful for the chance to serve with you on the subcommittee
    and to partner on this hearing, and thanks to our three
    talented witnesses for being here to share your expertise.
        The most significant area of enduring bipartisan consensus
    in U.S. foreign policy is the growing threat that the PRC poses
    to American security and our economy.
        That is why Senator Ricketts and I came together to lead
    this subcommittee on our trip to Taiwan and the Philippines, as
    chair and ranking. It was one of the very first bipartisan
    CODELs of this Congress, led by Senator Ricketts.
        For years, the national security establishment has
    correctly identified China as our central national security
    challenge.
        Today's hearing will explore China's gray zone activities
    which are increasingly offering Beijing an asymmetric advantage
    and that several administrations have struggled to respond to
    since they fall below the threshold of armed conflict.
        Our witnesses will spell out this wide range of activities
    used to coerce and bully and assert control over the Pacific.
    Let me give you just a few striking examples from this year of
    Beijing's brazen activities.
        In Australia, a U.S. treaty ally, for the first time we saw
    a large Chinese naval task group conduct a full
    circumnavigation of the continent and live fire exercises with
    no warning, an enormous show of force intended to intimidate
    Australia and send a signal to other regional States.
        Against Taiwan, record levels of incursion by the PLA into
    Taiwanese airspace and its economic zones, brazen election
    interference, cutting undersea cables, and much more.
        This spring, China conducted its largest ever military
    exercise around Taiwan, including simulated blockades and
    participation from the Chinese navy and coast guard.
        In 2023, the PLA conducted more than 1,700 sorties into
    Taiwan's airspace. That number jumped 80 percent in 2024 to
    more than 3,000, and this year it has already surpassed that
    number with 3 months left in the year.
        In the Philippines we saw firsthand how the PRC claims
    islands, reefs, and other features despite international legal
    rulings against it, and harasses Filipino vessels as a result,
    and the PLA is actively harassing our own pilots and vessels
    operating lawfully in international waters and airspace.
        What does this all mean and why does it matter? China is
    trying to change the facts on the ground in the Indo-Pacific
    just as Putin did with Crimea in 2014. They are hoping they can
    salami slice their way into asserting control of the region and
    forcing the United States out.
        Perhaps most ominously, they are intending to create so
    much noise in the area with their steadily increasing
    operational tempo creating a new normal that we will not be
    able to tell the difference between an invasion and an actual--
    between an exercise and an actual invasion of Taiwan.
        As INDOPACOM Commander Admiral Paparo has said, China's
    military exercises are no longer drills--they are rehearsals.
    The United States is an Indo-Pacific power and we cannot and
    should not back down.
        But how do we tackle this challenge? That we will hear from
    our witnesses and Chairman Ricketts and I will discuss with you
    today.
        The good news is our allies are stepping up in ways we have
    not seen before. They are clear-eyed about the threat and
    determined to serve on the front lines of defense.
        They are spending significantly more on defense and
    security and providing troops, training, access, and materiel
    critical as we shore up deterrence.
        The bad news, as China has ramped up, the Trump
    administration has also taken steps that erode key sources of
    our strength.
        The Trump administration has been willing to do several
    things with regards to Taiwan that I view as strengthening--
    excuse me--weakening our partnership: withholding prescheduled
    weapons sales and deliveries, canceling high-level defense
    dialogs, and denying the President of Taiwan transit through
    the United States.
        The administration has defunded Radio Free Asia, Voice of
    America, dismantled the Global Engagement Center, which risk
    leaving PRC disinformation unresponded to and uncontested.
        The administration has slapped our regional partners with
    significant tariffs from 10 to 50 percent, making them
    prioritize economic interests over contributions to their
    defense and our security partnerships.
        They have also withheld critical foreign assistance. One
    project, for example, is building a communications
    infrastructure in Asia that is secure and that China does not
    own.
        The administration has now embarked on a dangerous campaign
    of taking strikes against vessels in international waters off
    Venezuela, striking with impunity and creating a dubious legal
    precedent that I view as risking our own sailors in the Indo-
    Pacific as they do freedom of navigation operations.
        If we do not change course, if we continue to dole out
    concessions to China and look the other way as they change
    facts on the ground, we may well lose the fight for this
    century.
        So I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about how
    we should meet the challenge of this moment, how we can
    leverage the bipartisan consensus and cooperation we have on
    this key issue, and how we can strengthen our position in the
    Indo-Pacific.
        Thank you, and thank you, Chairman Ricketts.
        Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Ranking Member Coons.
        Today's hearing is on an egregious and continuing problem
    of Communist China's illegal, coercive, aggressive, and
    deceptive actions, also known as ICAD, in the Indo-Pacific.
        You will first notice the deliberate use of ICAD, coined by
    our Filipino friends, rather than gray zone. This is not just
    semantics. Gray zone allows Communist China to muddy the waters
    with regard to its intention and its involvement.
        It is perfectly trying to hide what it is trying to do, and
    gray zone allows them to be able to do that. ICAD dispels this
    ambiguity and allows for more appropriate responses.
        It is time to call out Beijing's behavior for what it
    actually is. It is illegal, coercive, aggressive, and
    deceptive.
        In April, as Senator Coons mentioned, he and I and Senator
    Budd saw Beijing's firsthand ICAD conduct on full display on a
    CODEL that we took to the Philippines and Taiwan.
        On a P-8 over-flight of the West Philippine Sea, we
    witnessed firsthand the sheer scope of Chinese illegal
    violation of the Philippines' exclusive economic zone.
        Communist China uses the full spectrum of ICAD measures to
    try to turn the West Philippine Sea into a Chinese lake with
    Beijing's illegitimate and illegal nine-dash line and
    undermining Philippine people's will to resist.
        Xi Jinping has referred to this as the smokeless
    battlefield that will allow Communist China to win without
    fighting. Thanks to the tireless work of the Philippines, this
    hostility has been publicly documented, making it impossible
    for Communist China to deny or for the world to ignore.
        However, despite the reputational cost, Communist China's
    dangerous aggression continues. In August we saw two Chinese
    vessels collide as they belligerently tried to ram a Filipino
    coast guard ship near the Scarborough Shoal.
        While this was a reckless and embarrassing event for Xi
    Jinping, it could have been much worse, particularly if there
    was a fatal collision with a Filipino vessel. This could have
    triggered our mutual defense treaty with the Philippines and
    started a war. Rather than appreciating the severe risks of its
    aggression, Communist China has instead doubled down.
        In addition to continuing to ram ships and shoot water
    cannons, Communist China has resorted to political lawfare,
    recently declaring Scarborough Reef as a nature reserve.
        Let us be clear, this is within the Philippines' EEZ, not
    Communist China's.
        In Taiwan, the story is not any better, as my colleague
    just highlighted. Taiwan continues to endure disinformation
    campaigns, cyber attacks, bans on Taiwanese food exports,
    undersea cable cutting, violations of airspace and exclusive
    economic zone, and increasingly larger military exercises
    simulating quarantines, blockades, and evasion.
        Under President Lai, Taiwan is taking critical steps to
    strengthen its resilience to Communist China's ICAD behavior
    including increasing national level planning and conducting
    civil defense exercises.
        But Taiwan still remains particularly vulnerable to
    coercion. This was evident in a tabletop exercise that Senator
    Coons and I held with Mr. Singleton earlier this year
    simulating a Chinese pressure campaign targeting Taiwan's
    energy.
        While Taiwanese and U.S. defense planners are right to
    prepare for a PLA invasion, a more immediate risk might be that
    Communist China will use its ICAD tactics to destroy Taiwan's
    ability to push back.
        If we are to successfully neutralize Chinese ICAD tactics
    targeting Taiwan it is clear that more needs to be done to
    bolster Taiwan's whole society resilience, military
    preparedness, and level of international support.
        Concerningly, Beijing's ICAD playbook is not confined to
    the West Philippine Sea or the Taiwan Strait but is now being
    used throughout the region. In February, Chinese warships
    sailed through the Tasman Sea and circumnavigated Australia's--
    sorry, circumvented Australia's coastline for more than 3
    weeks.
        They staged unprecedented live fire drills in a show of
    force meant to intimidate and stress Australia's ability to
    respond. Communist China is also increasingly militarizing the
    Yellow Sea, installing dual-purpose platforms in disputed
    territory with South Korea.
        Similarly, Beijing has stepped up construction of drilling
    rigs and other platforms along the median line with Japan in
    the East China Sea while it conducts a record number of coast
    guard patrols around the Senkaku Islands.
        So why does all this matter? To steal from Mr. Powell, as
    Sun Tzu said, the supreme excellence consists of breaking the
    enemy's resistance without fighting.
        This is right out of Sun Tzu's playbook. To be able to win,
    the greatest general never fights a battle--he defeats his
    enemy beforehand.
        Ultimately, Communist China would rather act as a python,
    slowly squeezing countries to resist rather than acting as a
    cobra and striking quickly.
        Communist China's ICAD tactics are central to this effort
    or, at the very least, they can provoke a kinetic response and
    give Beijing a pretext for self-defensive military action.
        The good news is we have allies and partners who are
    bravely confronting Beijing's ICAD behavior but they are
    currently overmatched. The United States must do more to even
    the scales and strengthen their resilience.
        Ranking Member Coons and I are working together to do just
    that. We introduced the Taiwan Energy Security and Anti-Embargo
    Act, which would facilitate increased American LNG exports to
    Taiwan, encourage cooperation with Taiwan on nuclear energy
    use, and ensure commerce with Taiwan continues in a
    contingency.
        We also introduced the Porcupine Act, which make it easier
    to quickly send arms that are critical to Taiwan to respond to
    and deter some of Communist China's ICAD activities.
        And finally, we recently introduced a resolution honoring
    the 75th anniversary of the U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense
    Treaty to ensure Communist China knows that the United States
    will continue to stand by our ally.
        But more needs to be done and I look forward to hearing
    from our witnesses to understand the evolution of Communist
    China's use of ICAD tactics and what the U.S. and specifically
    the Congress can do to combat them.
        And so we will now turn to our witnesses. We will ask our
    witnesses to keep your oral testimony to 5 minutes, please, and
    as a reminder, your written testimony will be submitted to the
    official record.
        Our first witness today is Craig Singleton. Mr. Singleton
    is a senior director for China and a senior fellow at the
    nonpartisan Foundation for Defense of Democracies where he
    focuses on great power competition with Beijing.
        A former U.S. diplomat with nearly two decades of service,
    he has worked extensively on China, North Korea, and the Indo-
    Pacific security. He also lectures at Stanford University on
    Chinese grand strategy.
        With that, Mr. Singleton, the floor is yours.

    STATEMENT OF CRAIG SINGLETON, CHINA PROGRAM DIRECTOR AND SENIOR
     FELLOW, FOUNDATION FOR DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES, WASHINGTON, DC

        Mr. Singleton. Chairman Ricketts, Ranking Member Coons, and
    distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for
    inviting me to testify.
        I am pleased to offer policy insights from the Foundation
    for Defense of Democracies, a nonpartisan research institute
    where I serve as a senior fellow.
        Today, China is preparing for a conflict it hopes never to
    fight by slowly engineering the conditions for Taiwan's
    subjugation. This is not a distant or hypothetical problem. It
    is happening now.
        Beijing's ICAD playbook is calibrated to be incremental and
    ambiguous, carefully designed to avoid tripping U.S. red lines
    while steadily degrading Taiwan's confidence in its future.
        In China's calculus, Taiwan must eventually conclude that
    resistance is futile, that capitulation, not confrontation, is
    the only rational choice.
        Beijing interprets vulnerabilities not only in Taiwan's
    defenses but also in U.S. and allied responses as validation of
    its approach.
        To date, sustained coercion below the threshold of war has
    not triggered decisive action. Instead, it has generated
    debate, delay, and uneven responses rather than unified
    pushback.
        This perception emboldens Beijing which views ambiguity and
    hesitation among democracies as exploitable gaps in deterrence,
    gaps that reinforce Beijing's conviction that time favors its
    strategy.
        One challenge is that deterrence as traditionally
    understood does not map cleanly on the problem China has
    created.
        Deterrence by denial, building enough military power to
    block an invasion, and deterrence by punishment, threatening
    retaliatory costs, both falter when the contest unfolds in the
    gray zone.
        Equally critical is resilience, Taiwan's ability to
    withstand and bounce back from sustained pressure without
    losing confidence in its future or faith in U.S. support.
        Our job is to flip China's logic, proving that Taiwan's
    society, economy, and partners can outlast coercion, that
    Taipei can get back up after each shove, and that Beijing gains
    nothing from dragging out the contest.
        But increasingly gray zone coercion is no longer a low-risk
    strategy. The more ships and planes Beijing surges around
    Taiwan the higher likelihood there is for an accident,
    collision, or exchange of fire.
        What looks like slow-motion strangulation could just as
    easily become a sudden shock, a crisis that neither side
    intended but both must confront.
        While Beijing has many avenues of coercion, one
    vulnerability stands out above all others--energy. Taiwan
    imports nearly all of its primary energy and about half of its
    electricity now comes from liquefied natural gas.
        Its storage depth is thin, barely 10 days for LNG, meaning
    even temporary disruptions could cascade quickly into political
    and social pressure.
        To stress test these risks, the Foundation for Defense of
    Democracies conducted a series of energy quarantine tabletop
    exercises in Taipei with Taiwanese officials and experts and in
    Europe and in the U.S. with public and private stakeholders.
        The findings were sobering. The exercises revealed how
    Beijing could exploit Taiwan's dependence by combining limited
    interdictions at sea, cyber-enabled disruption of energy
    infrastructure, and political disinformation, squeezing
    confidence without firing a shot.
        The lesson is clear. Energy is not just a technical
    vulnerability, it is Taiwan's Achilles' heel. So what should we
    do?
        Congress has a critical role in closing the deterrence gap.
    Three priorities stand out.
        First, help harden Taiwan's resilience. That means
    supporting efforts to diversify energy imports, strengthen
    cyber defenses around critical infrastructure, and build
    redundancy into Taiwan's power grid, ports, and defense supply
    chains.
        These are practical steps that make it harder for Beijing
    to exploit choke points and they buy time in a crisis.
        Second, strengthen allied and private sector signaling.
    Beijing counts on insurers, shippers, and markets to walk away
    at the first hint of risk, cutting off Taiwan's lifelines
    through commercial caution rather than open confrontation.
        Congress can press the administration to coordinate with
    allies on maritime insurance backstops and reflagging options
    so trade with Taiwan continues even under pressure.
        Third, make clear that coercion will carry costs. Congress
    can advance sanctions tools that target Chinese entities
    complicit in quarantine operations or cyber-enabled disruption.
        This does not mean threatening war. It means ensuring
    Beijing understands that coercion against Taiwan will trigger
    coordinated countermeasures.
        The goal is simple--to ensure Beijing concludes that
    coercion, whether slow motion strangulation or sudden shock,
    will fail.
        That is how we keep the peace, and that is why this
    committee's leadership is so essential. On behalf of the
    Foundation for Defense of Democracies, I thank you again for
    inviting me to testify today.

        [The prepared statement of Mr. Singleton is located at the
    end of this transcript begining of page 29.]

        Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Mr. Singleton.
        Our second witness is Ray Powell. Mr. Powell is the founder
    and executive director of SeaLight, a nonprofit maritime
    transparency initiative launched with the help of the Gordian
    Knot Center for National Security Innovation at Stanford
    University, California.
        He is also the co-host of the ``Why Should We Care About
    the Indo-Pacific'' podcast. Ray has served 35 years in the U.S.
    Air Force including posts in the Philippines, Japan, Germany,
    and Qatar, as well as combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.
        He has also served as the U.S. air attache to Vietnam and
    the U.S. defense attache to Australia.
        Mr. Powell, the floor is yours.

       STATEMENT OF RAYMOND POWELL, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SEALIGHT
                        FOUNDATION, STANFORD, CA

        Mr. Powell. Well, Chairman Ricketts, Ranking Member Coons,
    members, distinguished members, thank you so much on behalf of
    the SeaLight Foundation for the opportunity to testify today.
        The People's Republic of China is this century's most
    successful expansionist power, one that directly threatens U.S.
    interests in East Asia.
        While Russia's territorial aggressions capture headlines
    and trigger responses, it is actually China that has quietly
    achieved far greater imperial successes in the maritime domain
    through its mastery of gray zone tactics or what we now call
    illegal, coercive, aggressive, and deceptive, or ICAD, tactics.
        Yet, the United States has still not even articulated an
    effective counter-ICAD strategy. We are decades into losing a
    gray zone war we, largely, do not recognize we are supposed to
    be fighting.
        For over 50 years China has systematically seized effective
    control of vast ocean areas through patient, incremental
    expansion.
        Its campaign began with direct military action with its
    1974 Paracel Islands battle with South Vietnam but has since
    evolved into sophisticated civil-military tactics that have
    multiplied its gains across maritime East Asia.
        In blockading, occupying, and militarizing key maritime
    features across the South China Sea, Beijing has demonstrated
    strategic patience that has consistently outmaneuvered our
    outdated and inefficient response mechanisms.
        China's tactics extend beyond conquering reefs to include
    intrusive coast guard patrolling that establishes its claims of
    jurisdiction throughout its neighbors' waters in the South
    China Sea, around Taiwan and the Senkaku Islands, and in the
    Yellow Sea.
        Beijing also deploys oil platforms and aquaculture rigs to
    normalize administrative control over new areas through
    economic activities that also complicate countermeasures.
        Beijing expands its maritime empire with astonishing
    impunity. China's model represents a more successful
    expansionist threat than Russia's because it has mastered the
    art of winning without fighting.
        To do so, China has not relied solely on gray zone tactics
    at sea. It combines these tools with a highly sophisticated
    political warfare machinery that targets democratic weaknesses.
        Beijing enlists local adversaries to carry its message of
    China's inevitability, American retreat, and the futility of
    resistance so that governments will eventually make business
    decisions to accommodate Beijing's demands.
        The goals are complementary--steady erosion of the will to
    contest China's ambitions and gradual acceptance of a new
    normal, one of Chinese regional supremacy.
        In the Philippines we can see this clearly. Even as the
    world's bravest coast guard routinely faces extreme danger at
    sea from China's paramilitary ships, CCP acolytes organize
    lavish events ashore through united front-linked organizations
    assembling business and civic leaders to normalize CCP
    positions.
        It recruits and trains influencers through scholarships and
    other programs who then provide local voices for Chinese
    interests for broadcast on international media platforms.
        China's gray zone success exploits gaps in our national
    security bureaucracy designed as it was--designed as that
    bureaucracy was against historical conventional threats.
        Beijing identifies strategic features, establishes presence
    through ostensibly civilian means, then escalates through its
    maritime militia and coast guard and backed by military force,
    all while maintaining the fiction of a peacefully rising China
    persecuted by local provocations.
        Our window to act is not just closing, it is vanishing.
    Beijing is even now consolidating recent gains and turning
    toward new objectives.
        We urgently need a comprehensive national counter-ICAD
    strategy that coordinates diplomatic, informational, economic,
    legal, cyber, and security instruments to meet this challenge.
        This strategy must also learn from the Philippines example
    and creatively integrate assertive transparency as a core tool,
    proactively collecting and rapidly releasing evidence that
    systematically exposes China's gray zone aggressions to deny it
    the cover of opacity and deniability upon which it has built
    its campaign.
        We must repurpose agencies like the U.S. Agency for Global
    Media to counter political warfare, establish a development
    assistance program explicitly focused on building resilience
    against gray zone tactics, and mobilize our defense innovation
    ecosystem against this threat.
        Only a unified and well resourced national effort can
    prevent China's gray zone successes from becoming irreversible
    precedents. But to win we must first get our team on the field
    and organize for this campaign, the one we are already in.
        Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.

        [The prepared statement of Mr. Powell is located at the end
    of this transcript begining of page 41.]

        Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Mr. Powell.
        Our third witness today is Dr. Ely Ratner. Dr. Ratner is
    currently a principal at The Marathon Initiative. He served as
    Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security
    Affairs from 2021 to 2025, and as Deputy National Security
    Advisor to Vice President Joe Biden from 2015 to 2017.
        He has also worked at the State Department and in the U.S.
    Senate as a professional staff member on the Senate Foreign
    Relations Committee.
        Outside of government, Dr. Ratner has worked for a number
    of leading think tanks including the Council on Foreign
    Relations and the RAND Corporation.
        Dr. Ratner?

         STATEMENT OF DR. ELY RATNER, PRINCIPAL, THE MARATHON
                       INITIATIVE, WASHINGTON, DC

        Dr. Ratner. Chairman Ricketts, Ranking Member Coons,
    distinguished members of the subcommittee and committee, thank
    you for the opportunity to appear before you today.
        Let me begin by commending your strong bipartisan
    leadership to advance U.S. policy in the Indo-Pacific. This is
    desperately needed and more important than ever.
        As I have testified before, our stakes in the competition
    with China are enormous and, yet, despite significant progress
    the United States is still not addressing the challenge with
    the level of urgency, attention, or resources it demands.
        This is also true in the gray zone where U.S. policy is too
    often risk averse, reactive, and inconsistent. My fellow
    witnesses today have done a great job describing and assessing
    China's ICAD behavior so, Mr. Chairman, I will spend the
    balance of my time on the question of what we should do about
    it, highlighting a few recommendations from my written
    testimony for how Congress can help shape a new approach to
    this critical challenge.
        First, we can and should do more to strengthen our allies.
    It is profoundly in America's interest to have partners who can
    provide frontline defenses against China's coercion.
        When our allies are more capable they can do more on their
    own, they can contribute more to our collective defense, and in
    doing so they can help to strengthen deterrence and reduce the
    costs and risks shouldered by U.S. forces.
        This is why the Trump administration, tactics aside, is
    doing the right thing by urging our partners to spend more on
    defense.
        But many of them cannot do it entirely on their own,
    whether in the case of the Philippines or the Pacific Islands,
    and even though we acknowledge that China is our primary
    challenge, U.S. security assistance still does not reflect that
    reality including major programs such as U.S. foreign military
    financing.
        Going forward, Congress can lead in correcting this
    imbalance by ensuring that U.S. support both in scale and focus
    reflects this prioritization of the China challenge.
        Second, this is especially true when it comes to Taiwan
    where China's gray zone activities are growing more intense by
    the day. To be frank, I am concerned that the current direction
    of U.S. policy is reducing U.S. support for Taiwan and
    undermining America's commitment to peace and stability in the
    Taiwan Strait.
        Congress can lead by advancing an all-of-the-above strategy
    for Taiwan's defense and resilience that uses the full set of
    tools available consistent with and reaffirming our commitments
    under the Taiwan Relations Act.
        That should include timely foreign military sales, foreign
    military financing, Presidential drawdown authority, and
    support for Taiwan's defense industrial base.
        Mr. Chairman, we also have work to do here in Washington to
    compete more effectively in the gray zone and that starts with
    crisis preparedness.
        The administration needs to be ready with concrete options
    for specific contingencies such as a blockade of Second Thomas
    Shoal, a military over flight of Taiwan, or a maritime
    incursion close to Taiwan's shores.
        These could include rapid U.S. military deployments,
    coordinated responses with our allies, or preauthorized
    sanctions packages. Congress should use its full authorities,
    including briefings, hearings, and legislation to ensure that
    preparation is real and ongoing.
        Finally, as you heard from my colleagues today, we have
    more to do to compete in the information domain. Information
    operations are central to China's gray zone strategy, used to
    amplify its strengths, obscure its predatory activities, and
    shape global narratives to its advantage.
        Each year China's Government spends billions of dollars on
    State propaganda and overseas influence operations and, yet, to
    our own disadvantage U.S. policy in this space is nearly
    nonexistent.
        Instead, we should be proactively exposing, documenting,
    and publicizing China's illegal and coercive activities. Doing
    so can deter malign behavior, dilute the effectiveness of
    China's actions, and strengthen the resolve of partner
    governments to resist.
        To that end, Congress should lead an effort to build new
    U.S. institutions equipped and resourced to compete with China
    in the information domain.
        Otherwise, this prevailing gap will remain one of the most
    significant shortcomings in America's ability to meet the China
    challenge both in the gray zone and more broadly.
        Mr. Chairman, those are just a few of the recommendations
    from my written testimony. Thank you again for your leadership
    and I look forward to your questions.

        [The prepared statement of Dr. Ratner is located at the end
    of this transcript begining of page 54.]

        Senator Ricketts. Great. Thank you very much.
        Now we will go into a round of 5-minute questions.
        And, Senator Cornyn, I believe you have an intel briefing
    so I am going to take my first question and offer it to you.
        Senator Cornyn. Thank you.
        Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your courtesy. I would
    like to ask, maybe starting with Mr. Singleton and go down the
    row here, a few years ago when I visited Australia with Senator
    Warner, who was chairman of the Intelligence Committee, and
    Angus King and also another member of the Intelligence
    Committee, I was struck by the fact that talking to Australian
    parliamentarians that the assumption that I had made that
    Australia would join in any collective defense of Taiwan that
    the United States was involved in just as a matter of course.
        But because of the politics in their own country, the
    diaspora of Chinese in Australia, it caused me to question who
    might join us in that effort.
        Mr. Singleton, who can we rely on besides ourselves?
        Mr. Singleton. It is a great question, and I think what the
    PRC is doing is actively exploiting all the cleavages amongst
    the democracies to sow doubt on this question.
        I personally believe that in the event of a Taiwan
    contingency Canberra would step up, but it will, largely,
    depend on the political calculus in Canberra at the time, the
    makeup of its government and, of course, the Chinese get a vote
    and the leverage that they can employ over the Australians and
    all of our partners, frankly.
        I would put the most bang for my buck on the Japanese. I
    think we have seen real shifts in strategy, rhetoric, and
    resource allocation in Japan. The election of a new, very
    hawkish Japanese prime minister is an excellent sign.
        But ultimately, at the end of the day, I suspect this will
    come down to U.S. power and U.S. pressure in the region.
        Senator Cornyn. Mr. Powell, do you have a different view?
        Dr. Ratner?
        Mr. Powell. I do not. I completely agree with Mr.
    Singleton.
        I was the U.S. attach for Australia to 2020. I used to--
    when I would brief our incoming delegations I would often
    remind them that Australia is, despite all of our experience on
    the military side, is not the 51st State and does not
    necessarily sign up to everything that we decide to do even
    though they have been extraordinarily consistent in supporting
    U.S. operations throughout the decades.
        I think that one of the things we often forget is that when
    we are engaged in our own internal public discourse that the
    world watches and that they are also, in many cases,
    democracies and so it is very important that we sort of
    calibrate our rhetoric so that we bring them in rather than
    sort of find reasons to sort of cleave them off.
        So it is very important, I think, that we sometimes when we
    are talking out loud remember that the Australian people are
    listening.
        Senator Cornyn. Dr. Ratner, let me withhold that answer
    from you because the time is limited and I want to get back to
    all of you on another important topic.
        A few years ago as a result of COVID we realized how
    dependent we are on extended supply chains of critical
    technology, for example, advanced semiconductors, and it
    occurred to me and not just me alone but many of us that
    another pandemic, another war, another natural disaster would
    be disastrous to the United States in terms of our access to
    advanced semiconductors that we need for virtually everything,
    including our weapons.
        So I wanted to ask about our dependency on China for
    processing of critical minerals. Ninety percent of the world's
    critical minerals are processed in China.
        They use that as enormous leverage, and while we did plus
    up the Office of Strategic Capital and the Development Finance
    Corporation and the Working Families Tax Cut Act, otherwise
    known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, how should we use that
    leverage, leverage those authorities and that funding to
    counter PRC's dominance when it comes to critical mineral
    processing?
        We will start with you, Mr. Singleton.
        Mr. Singleton. Sure. I would just add that the late Chinese
    leader Deng Xiaoping said that the Middle East has oil but
    China has rare earths and they have shown a willingness to
    weaponize it in the last year.
        I think this gets back to your last question, where are our
    partners? The Australians are a natural partner here. They are
    a mining superpower.
        The Japanese have capital and they have connections in
    countries like Malaysia where President Trump is getting ready
    to go in a few weeks.
        We should be signing deals in this space aggressively,
    thinking about capital pooling but also offload agreements, and
    I think it just represents a tremendous opportunity for
    enhancing alliance cohesion in the region.
        Senator Cornyn. Let me ask Dr. Ratner, do you have a view?
        Dr. Ratner. I would agree with Mr. Singleton and just say
    that, look, we need to build secure supply chains with our
    allies and partners, not closing ourselves off from the rest of
    the world.
        Senator Cornyn. My time is up. Thank you, sir.
        Senator Ricketts. Ranking Member Coons?
        Oh, do you want to----
        Senator Coons. I am inclined to defer to Senator Duckworth
    if she is prepared to question because we are going to do a
    number of rounds.
        Senator Duckworth. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you,
    Ranking Member Coons.
        On my frequent travels to the Indo-Pacific, the PRC's
    coercive and aggressive tactics are never far from the
    forefront.
        Two years ago, I met with the Philippine coast guard just
    as we were delivering the first Black Hawk helicopter to them
    that was eagerly anticipated and had been put to use. They had
    endless examples of videos of the wildly aggressive actions
    coming from the PRC and those actions have only continued to
    escalate.
        We have seen the PRC weaponize the tourism industry and sow
    disinformation to try to destabilize their neighbors. This is
    all part of their playbook and we all recognize it.
        Illinois soybean farmers are feeling it today, too, as they
    are being screwed over amid the Trump tariffs, bearing the
    brunt of some very real pain right now.
        So having co-led repeated bipartisan delegations to the
    Shangri-La Dialogue in recent years, I know that there is
    strong appetite for continued United States commitment to the
    region, particularly as a Pacific power ourselves, and we all
    know that in our absence the PRC will fill that vacuum and
    exploit every loophole that they can find with energy
    dependencies being another obvious target.
        And we can project our power militarily and we must
    continue to show up for our allies and partners to keep proving
    that capability. But I feel very strongly that we have to show
    up on other fronts, too, and I believe there is a bipartisan
    interest in doing so, especially on the energy front.
        Mr. Singleton, you have discussed this already, how
    Taiwan's energy dependency is an acute and severe
    vulnerability.
        Can you elaborate on your recommendations and specific
    steps that the United States should take to ensure LNG supply
    flows remain stable and accessible? And, no, Senator Sullivan
    did not pay me to say that.
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Duckworth. What about other sources of energy?
    Because I have had this conversation with the Taiwans
    themselves. Thank you.
        Mr. Singleton. No, absolutely, it is wonderful to see you
    again, ma'am.
        Energy is Taiwan's soft underbelly. There is no doubt about
    it. They are--Taiwan has one of the most taxed grids of any
    OECD country.
        In the recent TTXs--and this is a fair warning for any
    think tanker that wants to go against the senator in a think
    tank or a war game. She had my number as the PRC in move one so
    that was pretty frightening.
        But we realized pretty quickly that the Chinese were going
    to leverage low-level administrative and lawfare tactics to
    start to require permission for LNG tankers to cross the
    strait.
        You keyed in immediately on the disinformation component
    with the cyber element as well, and it was designed to create
    societal panic, to force hard choices in Taiwan between
    powering households or powering industry and it cost me as
    China very, very little.
        I think, obviously, we need to be pressuring Taiwan's key
    suppliers, including Qatar, that if they do try to cutoff
    Taiwan that they face some pretty serious consequences from the
    U.S.
        Taiwan has to do its part. They need to be thinking about
    restarting mothballed nuclear facilities. They need to be
    thinking about purchasing their own LNG tanker fleet. That is
    something we can help them with.
        But we also can help them fast track the purchase of U.S.
    LNG, which is something they would like to do, as well as
    invest in infrastructure projects, expanded terminals,
    emergency storage.
        That will all encourage resilience measures that I think
    would enjoy broad bipartisan support on Capitol Hill.
        Senator Duckworth. Thank you. So the United States military
    presence is not only an essential tool for regional defense but
    also a fundamental element for proactive engagement and power
    projection, deterring the PRC from increasingly trying out
    their luck.
        We have a number of critical alliances and partnerships in
    the region. That we do not have to go it alone has always been
    one of our distinct advantages over the PRC in the Indo-
    Pacific.
        That commitment has to be a two-way street and our allies
    have to trust that we will actually show up and be there when
    the time comes. But that trust has been shaken this year.
        Mr. Powell, given your expertise on gray zone tactics, what
    strategies did the United States adopt to facilitate a
    coordinated approach with our Indo-Pacific partners in
    addressing the PRC's territorial claims and broader regional
    influences?
        Mr. Powell. Senator Duckworth, thank you for the question.
    One particular one that I have already mentioned in my opening
    comment and which we have spent a lot of time on is studying
    very hard what the Philippines has done with assertive
    transparency.
        Now, ``assertive transparency'' is a term that we developed
    at SeaLight; the Philippines itself does not use that exact
    term.
        But the systematic exposure, documentation, and release of
    information about gray zone tactics pulls back the curtain of
    China's opacity and deniability that they use to conduct their
    gray zone activities.
        In short, I think we should light up the gray zone.
        Senator Duckworth. Thank you. And can we replicate these
    strategies around the world? What can you say about specific
    regional concerns that we should bear in mind here?
        Mr. Powell. Well, do that is, I think, one reason why it is
    important to also bring in outside actors. Now, I recognize as
    an outside actor involved in the transparency space there is a
    little self-interest here.
        But I think one of the reasons that SeaLight exists is
    because we recognize it is actually very hard for governments
    to release information due to security, political, diplomatic,
    all kinds of different--just bureaucratic reasons.
        So I think there needs to be a combination of aggressively
    doing things like declassifying information, releasing
    information from government sources, which have the best
    information, but also bringing in private actors that actually
    bypass the government bureaucracies so that you can kind of
    have all hands on deck.
        Senator Duckworth. Thank you.
        I have a final question. May I--thank you, Mr. Chairman,
    for indulging me.
        I think, looking forward, there are many steps that the
    United States should take to mitigate the PRC's illegal and
    coercive actions in the Indo-Pacific but we also have to ensure
    that we keep open both diplomatic and financial channels with
    our partners to help them close their deficiencies.
        For instance, again, we talked about enhancing Taiwan's
    base load energy options. Previous administrations' efforts to
    mitigate the immediate PRC threat to Taiwan have worked.
        Yet, the Trump administration is withdrawing U.S. influence
    at a time when we actually need to show the PRC we remain with
    our friends.
        Dr. Ratner, what specific steps should the United States
    take to demonstrate its long-term commitment to the Indo-
    Pacific and its allies, and what are immediate and key
    components that need to be addressed and how can we reconcile
    those needs with this administration's retreat from our
    longstanding commitments?
        Dr. Ratner. Well, thank you, Senator Duckworth.
        I mean, clearly, I think we have heard from the chairman
    and ranking member as well as the witnesses today that we do
    need what we call a whole-of-government strategy that includes
    military operations and military support and assistance and
    being with our allies, as you suggest.
        But it is much more than that. We need our State Department
    rallying the international community in support of our allies.
        During the previous administration when the PRC would
    engage in these kind of activities against the Philippines
    there would be a chorus of over a dozen countries around the
    world speaking out about the dangers and the unacceptability of
    that behavior.
        So that is quite important. We need development assistance
    to be strengthening the resilience of our partners, helping
    with their economic development.
        We need the information part of this equation more clear to
    get the message out to the region and we need to think about
    legal tactics to be pushing back on China as well.
        I will add one other thing, Senator Duckworth, in the
    context of your original question to Mr. Singleton about
    energy, which is that the PRC has its own energy
    vulnerabilities and they have been doing a lot to try to patch
    those up, but they are not there yet.
        Their energy consumption is only increasing and they have
    major vulnerabilities in that regard just like they have major
    vulnerabilities politically, diplomatically, in the information
    space, with trade, finance, and economics.
        And we need to be much more strategic about how we are not
    just playing defense and trying to put band-aids on our own
    allies and partners but, rather, thinking about how do we layer
    our strengths with our allies and partners against China's
    weaknesses and vulnerabilities to create opportunities of
    advantage to start pushing back on this.
        There are a number of places to do that. I do not think we
    have done that effectively yet and we need to be willing to ask
    hard questions.
        It does not mean regime change. It does not mean we are
    going to take actions that undermine the livelihood of the
    Chinese people.
        But there are very much clear things we can do to push back
    on the regime in Beijing that we have not done yet and we ought
    to change that.
        Senator Duckworth. Thank you, Dr. Ratner. Thank you, Mr.
    Chairman.
        Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Senator Duckworth.
        Communist China's ICAD activities are expanding in scope,
    sophistication, and coordination across the Indo-Pacific. These
    are not isolated provocations. They are pillars of a systematic
    strategy to reshape the regional order in Beijing's favor.
        We are witnessing a pattern. Maritime intimidation in the
    East and South China Seas, cyber attacks and disinformation
    campaigns undermine democratic resilience, economic coercion
    used to silence criticism, and lawfare employed to legitimize
    illegal territorial claims.
        Each tactic reinforces the next. Together, they create a
    playbook of political warfare designed to erode sovereignty,
    fracture alliances, and normalize Chinese control through
    pressure--short of the pressure of war.
        So, Mr. Singleton, given the range of tactics, you
    mentioned, obviously, energy being Taiwan's, in particular,
    soft underbelly. But what tactic do you think or what has the
    Chinese ICAD activities that has been the most effective?
        Mr. Singleton. I think that what is fascinating about what
    they are sort of executing is that all of it is very self-
    reinforcing and I think Mr. Powell hit on this in his
    testimony.
        Enhanced and expanded military operations around Taiwan in
    particular feed into a political warfare messaging that you see
    that is intended to sort of wear them down and I think there is
    a psychological effect to this that over time it becomes clear
    that time is on China's side, that there is no other choice. It
    is a fait accompli.
        I think it is the use of psychological warfare that is
    unique and distinct from our model of soft power that we have
    not actually sort of contextualized and we have not built the
    tools and resources today to wage war with it.
        We did in the past, though. There is muscle memory from the
    Soviet Union when we went against Soviet active measures. I
    think we need to sort of dust off that playbook and start to
    think about how we can play in the sandbox here as well.
        I think Ray's point about sunlight is the best disinfectant
    is a cliche but I think it is particularly important as we talk
    about Chinese political warfare.
        Senator Ricketts. Mr. Powell, you talked about the need for
    strategy. Can you explain just broadly, like, what would a
    strategy look like? When you say strategy, help us understand
    specifically what you mean we should be doing.
        Mr. Powell. Chairman Ricketts, thank you.
        You know, I think it begins with having somebody whose
    responsibility it is to organize the campaign, right? So part
    of our problem is that we have--I mean, I have spent 35 years
    in the world's greatest military. It is also the world's
    biggest bureaucracy and it is--but it is primarily built around
    a hard power problem.
        As a 35-year military veteran I can tell you that in many
    ways this is not a military problem. It is a whole-of-
    government problem, a whole-of-society problem, and whose job
    is that?
        I mean, is there somebody on the National Security Council
    who is taking this on and saying, how do we wage a successful
    campaign against an ICAD enemy?
        And one of the things I think the--you know, I know,
    Chairman, that you have chosen the term ICAD over gray zone. I
    actually sort of use both interchangeably in part because I
    think that both are helpful for different reasons.
        In the gray zone case, I use it because China knows how to
    fill in all of those gaps in our bureaucracy. So however it is
    that we are organized, they will organize a counter campaign
    utilizing their sort of fusion--their civil-military fusion
    organization to sort of push into the gaps.
        And so we need somebody whose job it is to build the
    counter ICAD strategy and then to get everybody together.
    Unfortunately, I do not--I cannot tell you what all the
    elements of the strategy is.
        Obviously, I am very much a fan of the tactic of assertive
    transparency, but I think it is going to take some extremely
    deep thinking to figure that out.
        Senator Ricketts. Right.
        Dr. Ratner, obviously, you have spent a lot of time in
    government.
        Can you tell us a little bit about when you were in
    government what did those strategic options to respond to ICAD
    look like and what are some concrete things that we ought to be
    thinking about?
        Dr. Ratner. Well, Senator Ricketts, it relates to the point
    in my opening statement about preparedness because one of the
    things that we did do when I was at the Defense Department with
    the interagency was in fact to do a huge number of scenario
    planning, a lot of which was organized by the National Security
    Council so included economic measures and development measures
    as well and actually built a whole set of options around
    potential contingencies and then associated with them U.S.
    policy options up against escalatory ladders of actions the PRC
    could take.
        So I think that is really important work and that ought to
    continue, but that was not addressing what we were seeing on a
    day-to-day basis and I would again reflect back on the comment
    in my opening Statement that I think, frankly, as a government
    we have been too risk averse.
        We ought not be, you know, pigheaded in terms of our--or
    overly aggressive in terms of our reactions to get into some
    escalatory spiral to the PRC.
        But I do not think we are in danger of that and what we
    have been in danger of is self-deterrence and not at all
    testing what I would describe as the elasticity of
    decisionmaking in Beijing because they themselves are also
    quite risk averse against getting into a conflict with the
    United States.
        And as I look back on the last couple of decades that I
    have had the opportunity to work in the State Department, at
    the Defense Department, in the White House, up here on the
    Hill, there are very few instances where when the United States
    asserted itself with American power with our allies and with
    conviction and commitment that Beijing then becomes and tries
    to escalate against that.
        That has not happened very much. So what we need to do,
    whether it is in the Taiwan Strait, whether it is in the South
    China Sea, is to start pushing back in a way with our power and
    conviction and allies that, again, test that risk aversion in
    Beijing as well and I do not think we have done that
    sufficiently yet.
        Senator Ricketts. Would you agree with Mr. Powell that it
    maybe starts by putting one person in charge of designing the
    strategy to combat it?
        Dr. Ratner. I think that would help. In the previous
    administration there certainly were single individuals in the
    National Security Council that were in charge of doing that
    around particular issues, whether it was the Taiwan issue set
    or the South China Sea issue set.
        Whether we need someone regionally I think that is a good
    question. But I think I have seen the process working pretty
    well when there is a single individual around an issue set,
    yes.
        Senator Ricketts. Great, thank you.
        Senator Coons?
        Senator Coons. Thank you, Senator Ricketts, and thank you
    to all of our witnesses.
        So if I could, a part of the challenge of where we are
    right now is that the National Security Council has been
    significantly downgraded in terms of its staffing, its scope,
    its reach.
        We are reinvesting significantly in our military, which I
    think is a positive. We have had some fundamental restructuring
    in terms of our development program. USAID is gone and a number
    of its key programs like the Global Media Enterprise are either
    gone or being restructured.
        I will just posit that I think our greatest strength in
    terms of pushing back on China's illegal and coercive,
    aggressive, and deceptive behavior is our full spectrum all-of-
    government all-of-society approach, our economic power, and our
    alliances.
        And you had a conversation earlier with Senator Cornyn
    about Australia. I led a bipartisan CODEL to the U.S.-Australia
    Leadership Dialogue in Adelaide in the summer and was really
    struck at how uniformly the Australians are seized with the
    challenge of China, have significant reach in the region, in
    Papua New Guinea, in the Pacific Island nations, in terms of
    development, defense, diplomacy, and are a great partner.
        I would be interested in two things.
        Dr. Ratner, I was intrigued by your proposal in a recent
    Foreign Affairs article about a defense collective pact or a
    deterrence pact between the U.S., Australia, Japan, and the
    Philippines, and I would love it if you would expound on that a
    little bit more.
        And if you would, Mr. Powell and Mr. Singleton, how would
    you rebuild the capacity for a coordinated, focused engagement
    around resiliency for Taiwan and alliance coordination around
    ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific?
        We have got a scattered range of capabilities: the
    Development Finance Corporation, whose authorization has
    expired and cannot do new deals. We have got USTR, which is
    engaged in trade.
        We have got USTDA. These are all independent agencies. We
    have got the Foreign Commercial Service. We used to have in
    USAID development entities focusing on economic strength. In
    the State Department there is an economic bureau.
        How would you pull all of this together? Would you create a
    new agency? Would you come up with a coordinated approach, and
    if so, led by whom?
        How do we get the strategy, the focus, and the leadership
    to deliver on leaning in to our alliances, economic
    development, and our soft and hard power capabilities which in
    coordination should be enough to deter China but when
    disaggregated and discoordinated and discombobulated and
    defunded, I think are issuing an open invitation to increase
    coercion by China.
        Dr. Ratner, if you would, first, on the collective pact and
    then the other two. Forgive me for the very long question.
        Dr. Ratner. Well, thank you, Senator Coons.
        The proposal that I had put forward was for a Pacific
    defense pact, a collective defense pact between the United
    States, Australia, Japan, and the Philippines.
        The rationale for it is, look, the defining national
    security question of our time is how we prevent PRC aggression
    in the Western Pacific in their ambitions to revise the Indo-
    Pacific order and the international order.
        The consequences of that, as you well know, would be
    terrible for the United States and terrible for the world. If
    we do that as a team sport with our allies and partners it
    will, No. 1, be more effective, and, No. 2, come at lower cost
    and lower risk to U.S. forces.
        It is a win-win for the United States. We have great
    alliances with those three countries. We have good partnerships
    around the region but those alliances are not connected with
    each other and the question before us then is how do we make
    the whole greater than the sum of the parts as it relates to
    our alliances and how do we create structures so that we can
    actually operate together, deter together, fight together as
    necessary?
        And the fact of the matter is, whether we like it or not
    today we are not prepared to fight as a collective with our
    allies and partners. We do not have the command and control we
    need.
        We do not have the plans we need. We do not have the force
    posture we need. We are not operating together in the way that
    we need to.
        So we need institutions that bring together these countries
    to get prepared in that fashion and what I put forward was a
    proposal to do exactly that.
        Senator Coons. Well, thank you.
        I was struck at INDOPACOM at the senior level at which
    Australian military flag officers are integrated into the
    INDOPACOM, both planning and command and control, and I do
    think the Japanese have stepped up dramatically in terms of
    their defense investment and defense posture.
        And Korea over the last decade has steadily increased its
    posture, but I could not agree more it is not coordinated and
    it does not have interlocking security.
        Mr. Powell--if I might, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Powell. Senator Coons, thank you.
        On your question of coordination, how to build the--
    essentially, the institution I think we have to start
    domestically in part because, I mean, right now, the way that
    we are putting out policy geopolitics is just--it seems to be
    kind of a minor part of the overall understanding.
        So we have things coming out of Treasury and Commerce and
    all kinds of different parts of the government that seem to be
    disaggregated from the larger strategic problems.
        And so I do think that there needs to be somebody at a very
    senior level whose job it is to think about these things and
    how they are working toward victory or at least, you know,
    competing in this space.
        Second, on the question of whether we should build new
    agencies or repurpose the ones that we have, I think, you know,
    right now as many things have been defunded or even dismantled
    the question being, you know, whether we are talking about
    USAID or USAGM or any of these things, recognizing that there
    actually was an intent behind those things, however well it was
    being carried out, and maybe taking this moment to say, well,
    how do we either build something new or repurpose this thing so
    that it is fighting this fight that we are in right now.
        Because, you know, the idea of, OK, we do not like this
    tool in the toolbox so we are just going to remove it, well,
    yes, but what are we going to put back in the toolbox?
        Because, you know, maybe the new problem--the old tool did
    not fit very well so let us make a new tool or even if we can
    just cleanup the old tool and make it work better.
        And then, finally, I hate to be a one-note Nancy on this
    but, you know, I really do think that transparency has--and,
    again, this idea of assertive transparency has a lot to be said
    for because it is the thing that helps build democratic
    resilience.
        If you look at the Philippines, where were they before they
    began their assertive transparency program in early 2023? They
    were--their primary strategy was built around the problem of
    counterterrorism. They were basically asleep to what was
    happening in the West Philippine Sea.
        Where are they today? Their people are motivated. They are
    holding their lawmakers accountable. They have completely
    remade their strategy so it is focused on archipelagic defense.
        They are investing in their coast guard and their navy and
    their air force, and they are reaching out to a lot of allies
    and making their own allies and partners.
        They are extremely aggressively putting together, and they
    are doing this because in a democracy you need the support of
    the people and in order to get the support of the people you
    have to show them why, and that is what they have done.
        Mr. Singleton. Thank you, Senator, for the question.
        I think the first step is we have to articulate our desired
    end States in the region, which we have not done, and then you
    have to catalog the players who are involved.
        I think when we think both domestically and internationally
    it is clear that not every partner is going to do the same
    thing but every partner has to do something.
        The first step, of course, is we need to talk more openly
    with our partners and our allies about the Taiwan challenge in
    particular but I would also add what is happening in the South
    China Sea.
        Too often these conversations are happening in private. We
    need to start to talk about them in public and that forces, I
    think, hard political decisions both here and abroad about what
    we are actually willing to do to push back on Chinese ICAD
    behavior.
        It is vital that we have at least some centralized
    decisionmaking in our government about this. In the cold war we
    had individuals at the National Security Council specifically
    tasked with combating these sorts of activities. Those people
    do not exist anymore and have not for some time.
        The other thing we have to do, obviously, is resource it
    where Congress comes into play and then hold the
    administration, regardless of who is in power, accountable for
    those decisions and allocations.
        But all of that starts with identifying what is our desired
    end State in the region and, frankly, multiple administrations
    have not really done that very well.
        Senator Coons. Thank you. If I could just briefly.
        As the senior Democrat on defense appropriations, we are
    investing a massive amount in shipbuilding, in networks, in
    long-range fires, in next-generation fighters, all with an eye
    toward Indo-Pacific engagement and with China as our pacing
    threat.
        If the new National Security Strategy significantly
    deprioritizes the Indo-Pacific and the PRC threat, I am
    concerned about whether or not our allies will take that as a
    signal that we are significantly disengaging or under
    investing.
        I recognize that border security and ending the scourge of
    fentanyl and drug trafficking in our country is a priority for
    national security but I think the fight of this century, the
    definitional fight for free societies, is with the PRC and the
    CCP and I hope that we will be able to work together to find
    bipartisan ways to engage, to invest in Taiwan's resilience,
    and to buildup the alliances that will make us successful.
        Thank you, Senator.
        Senator Ricketts. All right.
        So, Mr. Singleton, you were talking about energy a little
    bit earlier about being the soft underbelly of Taiwan. The
    island imports 98 percent of its energy. I think it is 42 days
    of coal it has on hand. I think you said 10--maybe it is 11
    days of natural gas.
        You mentioned that they should dust off some of their
    mothballed nuclear facilities. Senator Coons and I had a
    tabletop exercise that we led with several of our colleagues to
    go through this with you.
        The scenario underscored how quickly an embargo or a
    blockade could escalate into a crisis and highlight some of
    these things and that is why we introduced the Taiwan Energy
    Security and Anti-Embargo Act to help strengthen Taiwan's
    energy resilience.
        Based upon that tabletop exercise that you facilitated in
    May and then, as you have said, you have done in other places
    as well, what are some of the key lessons that stand out and
    some of the concrete steps that we ought to be taking to be
    able to strengthen Taiwan's energy resilience?
        Mr. Singleton. No, thank you for the question.
        I think my key takeaway was just how easy it was for the
    PRC to exert a little bit of pressure and achieve the desired
    end state that it was hoping for, which was societal panic.
        Obviously, I think some of the key provisions we need to be
    thinking about are helping Taiwan with energy diversification.
    We have lots of LNG here.
        You are right, it is 10 days of storage there. We need to
    be thinking about how we can fast track and sign long-term
    deals, offload agreements with the Taiwanese. They want to buy
    our LNG. They want to diversify away from countries like Qatar.
        What can we do to sort of fast track that, and then
    encourage greater integration I think with some of the trusted
    suppliers including countries like Australia on the coal side.
        We can help them with things like strategic stockpiling. We
    can help them buildup emergency energy reserves, particularly
    in the coal space. We want to expand and I think Dr. Ratner
    used a great term, sort of elongate and expand the sort of
    deterrence rubber band, if you will, here to think beyond 10
    days.
        How many more days can we build in to build redundancy?
    Critical infrastructure resilience in Taiwan is a massive
    problem. We need to think about hardening their energy
    infrastructure.
        That includes LNG terminals and pipelines and power grids
    and ports, making them sort of--to inoculate them against some
    of the cyber operations and disruptions that the PRC is
    orchestrating, and we have to do this with the private sector.
        I think one of the key takeaways from both the exercise we
    did with the committee but also in foreign capitals was how
    much the insurance risk market plays in here and whether it is
    thinking about reflagging operations or potential convoy
    operations to break a quarantine or a blockade, but also to
    think about war-backed insurance that could be provided in the
    event of a contingency through U.S. and allied partners to
    ensure that transit of commercial goods and LNG continues to
    flow.
        Again, there are historical precedents for all of these
    things, particularly in the 1980's under Ronald Reagan and the
    Iran-Iraq war. We just have to dust off the history and get
    that muscle memory back.
        Senator Ricketts. Now, you also mentioned that China has
    its own vulnerabilities. What are some specific steps that we
    could do that would remind Communist China that they have got
    vulnerabilities as well?
        Mr. Singleton. Let us not forget that the Chinese are
    almost wholly dependent on their food needs from other
    countries. These are countries where the United States has
    tremendous diplomatic leverage.
        Dr. Ratner mentioned energy vulnerabilities. These are
    pretty severe and intense for the Chinese. But also we have to
    remember that the Chinese economy is currently in a State of
    disarray.
        We have exceptionally low growth. We have an economic model
    that is running on fumes and an economic model that is highly
    vulnerable to sanctions. I think sanction signaling is so
    important.
        I saw that Chairman Risch introduced a bill I think today
    on that very topic. We need to make clear to the Chinese that
    specific Chinese State-owned entities and banks could become
    targets of U.S. financial sanctions in the event that they
    pursue a quarantine operation and I think that that would
    seriously challenge China's calculus.
        Senator Ricketts. Senator Sullivan has a bill that would
    spell out the sanctions that would happen in a Taiwan
    contingency.
        Do you think that putting those down in writing, passing a
    bill, is something that is helpful in deterring Communist China
    or is that giving away our playbook?
        Mr. Singleton. I do not think it gives away our playbook. I
    think consistency in messaging is essential. It forms one of
    those--part of the three-legged stool, right?
        Consistent messaging, credible capacity, which is, I think,
    an area where the Biden administration really excelled, and we
    also have to be thinking about these coordinated
    countermeasures.
        That three-legged stool, I would say, there are
    opportunities to really harden it and do so through legislation
    but also very clear signaling to the PRC that this is not
    costless, and I think today the challenge, of course, is that
    the Chinese are increasingly becoming overconfident and that
    could lead to miscalculation.
        Senator Ricketts. If we were able to pass a sanctions bill
    such as Senator Sullivan has, what about getting our allies on
    board? You have all stressed the importance of our allies and I
    agree it is the strategic competitive advantage we have that
    the PRC will never have.
        So how do we work with our allies on something that would
    be involved in sanctions?
        Mr. Singleton. I think it takes work. It takes engagement,
    of course. I am reminded of the excellent work that the Biden
    administration actually did on unifying export controls on the
    PRC.
        Tarun Chhabra in particular at the NSC was flying around
    the world convincing all of our friends and allies to exert
    tool controls on the Chinese to slow down semiconductor
    manufacturing and tool design and chip design.
        We can mirror that same--piggyback on that same model, I
    think, by convincing partners and allies that we are all going
    to do this together, that it is a unified sanctions framework,
    and that there will probably have to be some select carve-outs
    in certain cases.
        Senator Ricketts. And then encouraging our allies like
    Japan and Australia to pass similar bills?
        Mr. Singleton. Whether they pass certain bills or there is
    just a commitment in kind to follow what we do, I think that
    signaling alone really seeds doubt into China's decisionmaking
    calculus and then they are forced to contend with whether they
    can continue to sustain a war against Taiwan or continue to
    fund certain parts of its military modernization.
        Senator Ricketts. Great.
        Senator Coons?
        Senator Coons. Thank you, Senator Ricketts.
        Let me just follow along in that line, Mr. Singleton. I do
    think that one of the things we need to keep thinking and
    working and legislating around is how do we make Xi Jinping's
    morning ritual not today, not this week, not this month, and
    having a common approach to presignaling about the price that
    will be imposed on China--China's leadership, China's economy--
    in exchange for their activities against Taiwan, helps deter.
        Senator Risch in particular but a number of other
    colleagues felt that if we had been more active and clear and
    aggressive in signaling to Putin the price he would pay for
    invading Ukraine we might have deterred Putin's invasion of
    Ukraine or full spectrum large-scale invasion since he
    initially invaded in 2014.
        What is your assessment of what scale and coordination of
    signaling around price would actually be most effective?
        Mr. Singleton. It is a great question. I actually think
    that some of the research that Bonny Lin has done at CSIS on
    gray zone responses is super helpful here.
        The longer that you delay a response to gray zone
    aggression you have to have a more outsized response to
    reestablish sort of a deterrent baseline. I think, as I sort of
    think about the PRC, I agree with Dr. Ratner.
        We are talking about a particularly risk-averse regime that
    is usually inward focused and I think very cognizant in their
    own discourse about their own limitations and weaknesses.
        I think us very cleanly mapping all of their dependencies
    and all of their vulnerabilities and starting to signal where
    we have leverage, whether it is in the tech space. I certainly
    think the economic space is one that has not been sort of
    addressed cohesively.
        Again, it just forces the Chinese to start to account for
    all of these potential complications that will make something
    that is already probably the most consequential and difficult
    invasion known to mankind even less likely.
        But then you cannot discount what we are seeing in the gray
    zone space and the silent subjugation and I think sort of the
    ramping up of activity there such that they are going--we want
    to buy time and slow them down.
        I think it is probably what we need to internalize as our
    strategy. Anything that does and accomplish that objective I
    think should be--get a fair shake.
        Senator Coons. Mr. Powell, last month the PRC announced a
    new national nature preserve at the Scarborough Shoal that
    would create a protected area around a whole coral reef
    ecosystem. Philippine officials have called this another PRC
    land grab.
        Could you just briefly walk through the impact of this
    designation and how it relates to a broader pattern of lawfare
    tactics designed, again, below the threshold of military
    aggression to expand PRC control in the South China Sea?
        Mr. Powell. Yes, Senator Coons. That is a great question,
    and I think as most of us know the PRC campaign for Scarborough
    Shoal really began in 2012 when it basically took effective
    control of access to Scarborough Shoal.
        And then last year--actually early in the year, what we saw
    was kind of a remarkable sequence of events. There was an
    expansion of Chinese paramilitary activity and I classify China
    coast guard and maritime militia as a paramilitary force in
    part because I think it is very important for us to realize
    that we do not have a paramilitary force, which is part of why
    we do not have a good response to these assets.
        So they began to deny Philippine access in a much more
    aggressive way early last year. They also sent in a scientific
    expedition to take a look at the condition of the shoal and two
    things happened.
        One is that they immediately banned their giant clam
    harvesting fleet, which all disappeared around June of last
    year, indicating that they probably found out that giant clam
    harvesting, which is extraordinarily destructive, had done
    great damage to the shoal, and second, they issued a report
    that said the condition of the shoal is great.
        So we then saw they also established straight baselines
    around the shoal, essentially marking it out as territory, and
    so this establishment of a nature preserve is sort of an
    environmental overlay onto that, you know, essentially land
    grab at this point.
        So we can see all of these things working together--the
    establishment of effective control, the lawfare, the
    administrative control, all of these things, and the denial of
    Philippine access.
        And in fact, Senator, I will also say that the collision
    that we observed in August was in part a result of this
    establishment of effective control because the Philippine ship
    that got in close to the shoal I think got in a lot closer than
    China expected, which was what drew in the destroyer which
    almost caused that mutual defense treaty triggering event that
    we all fear.
        So it is part of a larger campaign, and one last thing, on
    top of what Mr. Singleton has said about Taiwan and what we
    have all been talking about.
        I am one, because I have been looking at this in the South
    China Sea so long, I do not actually expect to see a large-
    scale quarantine or blockade or anything like that.
        I would be more afraid of what would start happening if all
    of a sudden China announced that it was going to enact a new
    safety regime for LNG ships inbound to Taiwan and begin to,
    say, turn around one and then maybe another one.
        And, again, that would be much more in line with the ICAD
    kind of campaign that they have been waging.
        Senator Coons. I agree with you that, look, we need to plan
    for and prepare for the possibility of a full-scale invasion of
    Taiwan.
        But doctrine, history, preparedness, risk aversion strongly
    suggests that they are much more likely to engage in the
    creeping, steady, aggressive behavior that you were just
    describing and that allows them to assert sovereignty over a
    greater and greater area of the region.
        Let me--a last question, if I might.
        Dr. Ratner, you have talked about how past U.S. policy has
    been overly reactive to PRC actions. What would a more
    proactive U.S. Government approach ideally look like, given
    where we are today and looking forward, given your experience?
        Dr. Ratner. Well, I guess I would--as I mentioned in my
    written testimony, I think there are a couple ways to think
    about this.
        One is at the tactical and operational level and then
    another is at the strategic level. I think at the tactical
    level, as we have talked about there are things we can be doing
    operationally to be doing our own salami slicing back.
        There are new emerging defense technologies, autonomy, low-
    cost, attritable systems that we can be using ourselves and
    providing to our partners for them to get out on the water and
    start asserting their claims instead of just defending against
    PRC incursions.
        There are things we can be doing on the development and
    assistance front to try to get ahead of the very likely forms
    of political influence operations, cyber intrusions that we
    know the PRC is conducting.
        Again, we talked about the information domain so there are
    ways to get after this. But I guess what I would say at the--
    one thing I think we have to remember as we think about this
    issue set is when we see the PRC doing something out at Second
    Thomas Shoal or out at Scarborough Shoal, those very specific
    tactical features and locations are important but they are part
    of a bigger story, which is China's ambitions to control the
    South China Sea, to control the East Asian littoral.
        What we need to be doing in response and in parallel to
    China's ICAD activities is not just playing whack-a-mole,
    though we should be out there defending their tactical moves,
    but rather thinking about what are the strategic actions we
    need to be taking to ensure that they cannot, in the end, have
    that kind of effective control that they want.
        So with the Philippines, for instance, yes, we need to be
    supporting them out at Scarborough Shoal, but we ought to be
    working on our force posture in the Philippines.
        We ought to be expanding the number of locations we are
    investing in. We ought to be investing a lot more in those
    locations to develop them. We should be bringing more advanced
    capabilities into those locations.
        We should be operating more and more with our allies and
    partners, the Australians and the Japanese, who both have
    reciprocal access agreements now with the Philippines. They can
    be operating and supporting these EDCA sites as well. They can
    be contributing development assistance that are connecting
    roads to our military sites.
        So when we pick up our heads a few years from now, yes,
    maybe China has more coast guard vessels around Second Thomas
    Shoal or Scarborough Reef but, hey, look, the United States has
    a collective defense pact with our partners.
        It has got a robust rotational military presence in the
    Philippines. It has got advanced counter ship capabilities now
    in the Philippines and we are operating with our allies and
    partners like never before.
        I think that is a strategic victory for the United States.
    That is what we ought to be aiming for.
        Senator Coons. Thank you. Thank you to all the witnesses
    and, thank you, Senator Ricketts, for our trip.
        We literally got to see Scarborough Shoal, Second Thomas
    Shoal, that whole West Philippine Sea region on our trip
    together earlier this year.
        It was enormously illuminating, and thank you for this
    hearing.
        Senator Ricketts. I am now going to exercise my privilege
    as chair to ask one last question.
        Just briefly, I want to followup with Mr. Powell. Based on
    that same topic with regard to the Philippines, Senator Coons
    and I introduced the resolution celebrating the 74th
    anniversary of our defense treaty with the Philippines.
        But what are some--I will give you an opportunity to just
    talk about some--what are some of the concrete steps we can do
    to be able to help shore up that relationship with the
    Philippines and help build their confidence and resilience
    against these--you know, these behaviors from China that are
    aggressive, coercive, illegal, and deceptive?
        Mr. Powell. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much for that
    question.
        The Philippines, of course, is extremely dear to my heart.
    Not only have I been married to the Philippines for 35 years, I
    also have, you know, spent a lot of time in the Philippines
    working with the Philippine Government and others there.
        So I think one of the things--you know, back to the fact
    that the Philippines is a democracy and remembering that
    letting not just the Philippine Government but the Philippine
    people know that America is behind them is really important.
        So I commend you for the resolution. I think those kinds of
    Statements are extraordinarily important in the overall
    campaign to reinforce the U.S. commitment to the Philippines.
        I cannot tell you how many times I was asked about the
    mutual defense treaty since early 2023 every time there was a
    ramming or a water cannoning or all kinds of things.
        So there is a lot of concern there that they might be
    abandoned, and as a democracy it is important to note that
    there is a great deal of political warfare in the Philippines,
    that there are groups and--I mean, there was recently a large,
    lavish reception at a swanky hotel in Manila in which basically
    a Philippine council for the reunification of Taiwan assembled
    the Chinese Ambassador and a host of Philippine groups to
    promote Philippine-Chinese friendship, some of which receive
    money directly from China, some of which are supported by
    united front organizations, many very powerful business and
    other kinds of civic leaders.
        So they are in the game very much. So anything that helps
    strengthen the U.S. message that the U.S. has committed
    because, you know, China knows about elections.
        It knows that prior to this administration in the
    Philippines there was an administration that was much
    friendlier to it and there could be in the future, and they
    want to pave the way for that future because they believe that
    a lot more of the fruit will fall from the tree if they have a
    friendly administration.
        So one specific recommendation that might even make Dr.
    Ratner, who used to be in the Pentagon and would have received
    briefings from his people on this idea, squirm a little bit,
    but I have actually recommended that people should go and visit
    the civilian population at Thitu Island in the Spratly
    archipelago.
        I have studied the South China Sea for decades and I can
    tell you that we have as the United States avoided that because
    we have not wanted to sort of throw in our lot with any one
    claim on the fear that we would have to sort of try to then be
    forced to adjudicate all claims.
        But there is a civilian population at Thitu Island. There
    is a runway. You can easily get there by aircraft, and it would
    be a tremendous show of support for a population that wakes up
    every morning and sees dozens of coast guard and maritime
    militia ships not just on the horizon but right there just a
    couple nautical miles away from their shores reminding them
    that China believes they own that island and is coming for it
    eventually.
        So because China is pressing that claim I believe it would
    be very helpful for the United States not only to conduct
    medical civic action programs out there, bring out some
    military doctors and engineers, work alongside our Philippine
    friends and, frankly, U.S. senators should go out there and
    visit and remind them that we stand shoulder to shoulder in a
    very, very real way.
        So thank you again, sir.
        Dr. Ratner. Senator, could I respond to that very quickly?
        Senator Ricketts. Yes, absolutely.
        Dr. Ratner. Mr. Powell invoked my name. He will be happy to
    see in my written testimony that the last concrete
    recommendation that I have is that the United States actually
    revisit its position of not taking a position on the
    sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea because our
    neutrality has been existing in the context of complete PRC
    violation of international law.
        We ought to do it carefully but I think there are models
    like the way that we approach the Senkaku Islands where we
    recognize Japanese administration without taking a position on
    sovereignty.
        We could do something similar in the South China Sea that
    would open up exactly the kind of cooperation that Mr. Powell
    is talking about.
        So we ought to think about how can we support our allies
    and partners in the defense of their own contested features and
    we would need a change in our overall position on the
    sovereignty disputes to do that. So that is something we ought
    to take a careful look at.
        Senator Ricketts. Great. Thank you very much.
        Well, I want to thank all of our witnesses today for a
    really great conversation we had about what further we need to
    do to oppose the Communist China's ICAD activities in the Indo-
    Pacific. Really, really valuable.
        I appreciate everybody's contribution and all your service
    to our great nation.
        And with that, the hearing is over.

        [Whereupon, at 3:51 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]

                 Prepared Statements Submitted by the Witnesses

                     Prepared Statement of Craig Singleton

                   China Program Director and Senior Fellow,
                     Foundation for Defense of Democracies

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

                    Prepared Statement of Raymond M. Powell

                    Executive Director, Sealight Foundation

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

                        Prepared Statement of Ely Ratner

                    Principal at The Marathon Initiative and
                       Senior Advisor Clarion Strategies

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

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