Chinese leaders see themselves in competition with the United States to build military power in space. The ongoing development of U.S. and Chinese capabilities could lead to unstable competition in space, raising the risk of rapid, and perhaps unintended, military escalation. This report surveys open-source literature across the Chinese defense enterprise to present a composite image of Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) perspectives and key factors for U.S.-China crisis stability in space. It draws on authoritative materials, including leader speeches reported in official media, defense white papers, and official professional military education, which collectively reflect political leader guidance and PLA strategy and doctrine.

The findings suggest that the PLAs thinking on escalation dynamics in space has become significantly more risk-tolerant than that found in PLA documents published just a decade prior. This shift emphasizes Xi Jinpings guidance to be more proactive in shaping the international environment, which includes accepting higher but carefully calibrated levels of risk even though such proactive measures might result in unintended escalation with the United States. This higher escalation tolerance is complicated by Chinese leaders inflated threat perceptions of the United States and resultant policy approach that resists cooperating with the United States to arrest unintended crisis escalation.