This essay offers an analytical framework and a set of assumptions for assessing China's security policies and reviews important trends in China's security relations. The analytical approach should help us know what to look for when observing key events ahead. These include: Taiwan's 2001 Legislative Yuan elections; economic developments in cross-Straits relations; arms acquisitions and military exercises on the mainland and in Taiwan; Chinese and American diplomatic overtures in Northeast Asia, Southeast Asia, and South Asia; and the 2002 Chinese Communist Party congress.

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