China expert Gordon Chang and retired Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer told Newsmax Friday that China does not respect President Joe Biden and that lack of respect is threatening world peace and leading to increasing aggression from the communist nation.
Biden tripped and fell after handing out the last diploma at a graduation ceremony at the U.S. Air Force Academy on Thursday. The White House said he was "fine" after tripping over a sandbag.
During the 2020 presidential race, Biden had mocked then-President Donald Trump for gingerly walking down the steps at the West Point commencement ceremony.
During an appearance on Newsmax's "The Chris Salcedo Show," Chang pointed out that "anybody can fall," but said "the problem is Joe Biden has sort of set that as a test ... for President Trump. So he should be judged by that same standard."
"We know that Communist China doesn't respect Joe Biden and we've seen this in a number of different ways because deterrence is breaking down," he said. "The most visible way recently has been that big spy balloon that flew over our country in January and February. That showed utter disrespect for the Biden administration."
Shaffer agreed with Chang's assessment and said that "nobody respects" Biden.
"What's worse is that people have not recognized the reason [Vladimir] Putin invaded Ukraine," he said. "The Russians weren't prepared, but they bet that they would have the lackluster response that we've seen from Joe Biden based on what happened in Afghanistan. So, the greatest danger to world peace ... is the fact that no one respects Joe Biden."
"If you don't have respect for the senior executive, deterrents do not work," Shaffer continued. "And if deterrents do not work, those who have ambitions are very likely to act and I think this has increased the danger of China misreading what we can do.
"They bragged over the weekend about taking out, virtually, one of our aircraft carriers. They did a dangerous flight in front of one of our RC-135s. These are provocations meant to send a signal that they're getting ready to do something and nobody is pushing back. The last guy who would ever push back is the guy falling on the stage — Joe Biden."
Responding to reports of the Air Force experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI), Shaffer said that "Elon Musk has acknowledged" the dangers of AI to humanity.
"Everything we're using right now has some level of chip, of processor, in it," he said. "If you allow the development of unbound AI, and you give it the ability to do things without understanding context or ethics, you're going to run us into all sorts of problems.
"The Chinese understand this too," he continued. "The Chinese are working hard to understand how to use AI against us. This is another area that we are lagging in. So, we've got to take this seriously. We've got to get ahead of it as quick as we can."
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