Then why would we assume they want anything other than an escalation cycle? Didn't foreign orders fall by some massive amount over the past year? One narrative for why the Chinese people tolerate their totalitarian dictatorship is the economic growth and prosperity they believe that it has bought them.
This is not likely to remain constant given the above, and thus the tolerance of the totalitarian dictatorship is similarly unlikely to remain constant, and what does a dictator with a slipping grip on power want to shore it up? A nice foreign skirmish.
If this cycle gets momentum, with the war in Ukraine going on, there is no way to control where it goes. It's the ultimate gamble. I thought they would be more careful than to roll the iron dice.
If you're a one man dictator shop and you're guaranteed to lose unless you roll, I guess you roll. To hell with the collateral damage, if you cared about that you wouldn't be a dicator to begin with.
This is not likely to remain constant given the above, and thus the tolerance of the totalitarian dictatorship is similarly unlikely to remain constant, and what does a dictator with a slipping grip on power want to shore it up? A nice foreign skirmish.