There are those today questioning why America should continue to confront China and risk a possible war costing countless lives and devastating the world.
Rather, they would have America come to an accommodation with China, allowing both global superpowers to coexist harmoniously and prosper.
Seductive as this sentiment may be, especially given the prospect of the alternative, it fails to fully consider the nature and ambitions of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and particularly those of its supreme leader, Xi Jinping.
Under his reign, Xi is intent upon China ascending to the top of the global food chain and supplanting America from its position. Along with the CCP's economic coercion; currency warfare against the U.S. dollar through BRICS; and military alliances with Iran, North Korea, and Russia, Beijing has poured billions of dollars into cultural warfare against the West, exerting influences in the arts, culture, and entertainment fields.
Take, for example, the capture of Hollywood. Xi leveraged China's massive film market to gain control of Hollywood.
U.S. studios often tailor content to meet Beijing's approval to gain access to Chinese theaters. This includes self-censorship of topics sensitive to Beijing, such as Tibet, Taiwan, or human rights abuses.
Movies critical of China may struggle to get financing or distribution.
Many U.S. corporations with financial stakes in China — such as Apple, Nike, and the NBA — are constantly submitting themselves to Beijing's pressure and censorship policies. Companies that take stances contrary to the CCP's interests risk losing access to the Chinese market.
The NBA, for example, faced backlash in 2019 after a Houston Rockets executive tweeted support for Hong Kong protesters.
While Hollywood and many major American corporations have surrendered to Xi's global propaganda campaign, a U.S.-based performing arts group defied, became the biggest thorn in Xi Jinping's side, and achieved stunning success against all odds.
Shen Yun — a New York-based nonprofit arts group founded in 2006 by Falun Gong practitioners, whose faith has been brutally persecuted by the CCP since 1999 — has been courageously fighting against the CCP's cultural warfare. Despite the CCP's relentless and vicious attacks, Shen Yun emerged as a powerful cultural phenomenon to deter the CCP's ambition to capture the West through propaganda and censorship.
Each year, Shen Yun tours around the U.S. with 400 to 500 shows, showing the beauty of an ancient culture and civilization before communist takeover. Unlike Hollywood, Shen Yun doesn't profit from complying to Xi Jinping's censorship policy and turning a blind eye to the CCP's crimes against humanity.
Two agents working on behalf of the CCP were recently found guilty of attempting to bribe IRS officials into revoking Shen Yun's nonprofit tax-exempt status, as reported in a recent article.
This incident, one of many others like it, offers a glimpse of the dark world that Xi envisions, wherein the norms and practices of his brand of iron-fisted, autocratic rule — featuring heavy surveillance, censorship, and political repression — become globally accepted.
President Donald Trump most recently named himself the chairman of the Kennedy Center, the nation's premier cultural center and a beacon for American greatness.
The Kennedy Center has long been used by the CCP to advance its goal of exerting influence on U.S. public audiences. CCP state-sponsored shows are heavily promoted by the Kennedy Center as well as its partner in crime: the Chinese Embassy.
Republican Reps. Chris Smith of New Jersey, chairman of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and John Moolenaar of Michigan, chairman of the House Select Committee on the CCP, warned Kennedy Center against subsidizing CCP propaganda.
President Trump and his newly appointed board can stop the CCP from making Kennedy Center a vehicle for the CCP's ideological crusades.
America's arts and culture community must fight CCP propaganda on US soil.
As Winston Churchill said to Neville Chamberlain after Britain's infamous accommodation with Adolf Hitler: "You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor, and you will have war."
Xi now offers America a similar choice. President Trump has the mandate to fight - bring it on.
Lee Steinhauer is a strategic policy and political consultant known for his book "The Art of The New Cold War: America vs. China. What America Must Do to Win." Lee is a frequent guest on Fox, Fox Business, Newsmax, and a published policy and opinion writer for numerous media publications. Read Lee Steinhauer's Reports — More Here.