And while Xi might be extremely competent,
That is questionable at best whether the autocracy of the CCP has been competent or not due to the lack of transparency and general unwillingness to admit mistakes. In my personal opinion, Xi might talk as if he has the best interest of the people, but his actions have shown him consolidating power while his policies feel like they are impeding the Chinese economic growth and restricting individual freedoms rather than truly building common prosperity or improving the lives of China’s citizens.
Was the success of China over the years due to the CCP’s guidance or was it from the sweat, blood, and labor of the Chinese people who were the largest population on earth who were hitting their peak productive years?
Was the CCP competent for splitting with the soviets, siding with the west, and adopting capitalism or were they failing so pathetically with their great leap and 5 year plans and their relationship with the soviets already so toxic that it was worth a bet to take the carrot the US was waving?
Did China under the CCP truly achieve greatness by developing the to the #2 economy in the world or did they just sell out all their natural resources, exploited the golden years of their population, and polluted their environment beyond repair within 1 generation while inefficiently squandering the money on overbuilding infrastructure, having money be stolen by corrupt officials, and/or otherwise misspent on controlling their population like imposing the 1 child policy which has lead to a skewed gender ratio along with an unavertable population crisis?
Tough to say. Maybe a bit of both. China certainly has become stronger than it was before and it was done under the leadership of the CCP, but we don’t have anything else to compare it to.
autocracies have a great deal of corruption in selecting the next in line. Usually the preceding Autocrat isn’t as competent.
Also Xi administration is pushing towards totalitarianism which differentiates from the single party, but not single individual control of authoritarianism. Xi has moved from crushed those with opposing views within the party, to the rich who could POTENTIALLY oppose him, to media that MIGHT disagree with him, to celebrities that MAY use their QUESTIONABLY greater influence to speak out against him, and basically took a bat to everyone and everything as China closes into it’s next big national congress where the leaders are “elected”. The same party where Xi has consolidated more power than anyone in the CCP’s history outside of Mao, ingrained his “Xi thought” alongside Maoism, AND conveniently removed term limits on the presidency which he would otherwise not be up for election for (Xi’s so nice to think of the next guy!)
Putin has already shown that no matter how great, smart, cunning, or politically savvy a leader is: A man is still a man. A man can have moments of weakness, make mistakes, grow old, get sick, become senile, easily be betrayed, easily make enemies, and do things in his own best interest rather than what is best for the many.
