119. No Winning Without Fighting: How China’s View of Hybrid Warfare Has Evolved with Dr. Howard Wang

“The PLA expected Russia to run the same playbook it did with Crimea on a larger scale. And it didn’t work.”

[Editor’s Note: Today’s post welcomes back proclaimed Mad Scientist Dr. Howard Wang, who recently served as a subject matter expert on our Ukraine, the Middle East, and Proxy Wars around the Globe: Emergent Trends and Associated Implications for the Joint Force panel discussion during the T2COM G-2’s Mad Scientist / William and Mary Great Power Competition & Conflict in the Age of Authoritarian Collusion virtual event on 27 January 2026 — check out the top ten take-aways from this informative event here.

In this episode of The Convergence podcast, Dr. Wang explores how China’s observations of Russia’s protracted war in Ukraine have transformed their approach to contemporary conflict, challenging their long-held precept of “winning without fighting” and forcing the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA’s) re-calibration of its hybrid warfare concept — with cognitive warfare now being harnessed to complement kinetic operations to achieve battlefield success. Dr. Wang also describes how the U.S. can harden itself against the PLA's "systems destruction warfare" -- Enjoy!]

Dr. Howard Wang is a political scientist at RAND. From 2024-2025, he was detailed to the Office of the Secretary of Defense as a China Policy Advisor to the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia. Prior to RAND, he was a policy analyst for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, where he researched U.S.-China military competition and deterrence in the Taiwan Strait.

Dr. Wang’s primary research interests include Chinese Communist Party (CCP) political decision-making and People’s Liberation Army (PLA) strategy and doctrine. He completed his Doctorate in International Affairs (DIA) at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, where he was awarded distinction for his thesis research on the CCP’s sea power strategy. Dr. Wang completed his Master’s in Public Policy at Georgetown University McCourt School of Public Policy and his bachelor’s degree at Boston University. Dr. Wang co-authored China’s Lessons from the Russia-Ukraine War: Perceived New Strategic Opportunities and an Emerging Model of Hybrid Warfare, RAND Report, 22 May 2025.

In our latest episode of The Convergence podcast, we sat down with Dr. Wang to discuss China’s approach to hybrid warfare, the implications of their “win without fighting” strategy, and what this means for the U.S. Army and Joint Force. The following bullet points highlight key insights from our conversation with him:

• Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine led China’s PLA to shift its thoughts on hybrid warfare. Following Russia’s failed gambit to rapidly seize Ukraine in 2022, the PLA became more accepting of the idea that a confrontation with the U.S. may result in a large-scale conflict. Rather than abandoning their hybrid warfare concept, they adjusted it to incorporate a number of non-kinetic methods to help the PLA achieve kinetic success on the battlefield.

• The PLA is resigning itself to the idea that winning without fighting will fail, and believe that the U.S. m...