China's historical civilization dates to at least the 13th century B.C., first under the Shang (to 1046 B.C.) and then the Zhou (1046-221 B.C.) dynasties. The imperial era of China began in 221 B.C. under the Qin Dynasty and lasted until the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1912. During this period, China alternated between periods of unity and disunity under a succession of imperial dynasties. In the 19th century, the Qing Dynasty suffered heavily from overextension by territorial conquest, insolvency, civil war, imperialism, military defeats, and foreign expropriation of ports and infrastructure. It collapsed following the Revolution of 1911, and China became a republic under SUN Yat-sen of the Kuomintang (KMT or Nationalist) Party. However, the republic was beset by division, warlordism, and continued foreign intervention. In the late 1920s, a civil war erupted between the ruling KMT-controlled government, led by CHIANG Kai-shek, and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Japan occupied much of northeastern China in the early 1930s, and then launched a full-scale invasion of the country in 1937. The resulting eight years of warfare devastated the country and cost up to 20 million Chinese lives by the time of Japan’s defeat in 1945. The Nationalist-Communist civil war continued with renewed intensity after the end of World War II and culminated with a CCP victory in 1949, under the leadership of MAO Zedong.

MAO and the CCP established an autocratic socialist system that, while ensuring the PRC's sovereignty, imposed strict controls over everyday life and launched agricultural, economic, political, and social policies -- such as the Great Leap Forward (1958-1962) and the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) -- that cost the lives of millions of people. MAO died in 1976. Beginning in 1978, leaders DENG Xiaoping, JIANG Zemin, and HU Jintao focused on market-oriented economic development and opening up the country to foreign trade, while maintaining the rule of the CCP. Since the change, China has been among the world’s fastest growing economies, with real gross domestic product averaging over 9% growth annually through 2021, lifting an estimated 800 million people out of poverty and dramatically improving overall living standards. By 2011, the PRC’s economy was the second largest in the world. Current leader XI Jinping has continued these policies but has also maintained tight political controls. Over the past decade, China has increased its global outreach, including military deployments, participation in international organizations, and a global connectivity plan in 2013 called the "Belt and Road Initiative" (BRI). Many nations have signed on to BRI agreements to attract PRC investment, but others have expressed concerns about such issues as the opaque nature of the projects, financing, and potentially unsustainable debt obligations. XI Jinping assumed the positions of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party and Chairman of the Central Military Commission in 2012 and President in 2013. In 2018, the PRC’s National People’s Congress passed an amendment abolishing presidential term limits, which allowed XI to gain a third five-year term in 2023. 

 

China National Space Administration (CNSA; established in 1993); Administration for Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND; subordinate to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology); People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Aerospace Force (in 2024, the PLA created the Aerospace Force from the former Strategic Support Force, which had included the Space Systems Department and the China Manned Space Engineering Office or CMSEO) (2024)

Has a large, comprehensive, and ambitious space program and is considered one of the World’s leading space powers; capable of manufacturing and operating the full spectrum of space launch vehicles (SLVs) and spacecraft, including human crewed, satellite launchers, lunar/inter-planetary/asteroid probes, satellites (communications, remote sensing, navigational, scientific, etc.), space stations, and re-usable space transportation systems, such as orbital space planes/shuttles; trains astronauts (taikonauts); researches and develops a range of other space-related capabilities, including advanced telecommunications, optics, spacecraft components, satellite payloads, etc.; participates in international space programs, such as the Square Kilometer Array Project radio telescope project and co-leads (with Australian and Japan) the Global Earth Observation System of Systems; has signed space cooperation agreements with more than 30 countries, including Brazil, Canada, France, and Russia, as well as the European Space Agency (note – the US NASA is barred by a 2011 law from cooperating with the Chinese bilaterally in space unless approved by the US Congress; the US also objected to China’s participation in the International Space Station program); has a space industry dominated by two state-owned aerospace enterprises but since announcing in 2014 that it would allow private investment into the traditionally state-dominated space industry has developed a substantial commercial space sector, including space launch services (2024)