One of the literary descriptions of the Chinese people is often wrapped in one word–inscrutable. Among that word’s synonyms are the following: incomprehensible, unexplainable, unfathomable, impenetrable, inexplicable, ambiguous, and difficult. I think of the nation of China, in general terms, as two things more –extremely patient and schizophrenic.

One of the most validating proofs of the patience of the Chinese is found in, I think, the matter of the debt it has purchased and maintained on its financial books–especially the debt of the United States of America. It is estimated that China holds U.S. Treasury bonds and other debts totaling approximately $1 trillion. The Chinese nation holds indebtedness of other nations, also, to the approximate tune of $2 trillion. It is a troubling matter that this is the case, when one considers that China has been, since the revolution that brought communism to power, America and the world’s most dangerous adversary. It is the most dangerous because of the synonyms above that define the Chinese communist leadership since, particularly, the time of Mao Zedong. They have been all of those things: incomprehensible, unexplainable, unfathomable, impenetrable, inexplicable, ambiguous, and difficult.

And now they hold the wealth of America and the world in the palms of their inscrutable hands. The question arises: Why do they keep purchasing debt, when they might never collect, seeing as how all nations are headed, obviously, toward the fiscal abyss?

Is it just that they, like most of the world’s economic gurus seem to think, believe that no matter how bad it gets, a solution will magically be found, and the indebted nations will make good on their restoration to financial health? They have been, since that communist revolution, the most bellicose of enemies in terms of threatening anyone who crosses them. Why the patience now, gladly holding the debt of their enemies, who by any stretch of the imagination have no hope of repaying the debt that is growing exponentially?

Now, I know the Chinese have made protests and even threats of fiscal action if their debtors don’t straighten up their economic acts. But, for the most part, the Chinese leadership’s patience is…well…inscrutable. Add to all of this perplexity another piece of the Chinese puzzle.

The U.S. Defense Department first reported in 2015 Chinese dredging vessels around Fiery Cross Reef in the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. They have since completed literal island building, upon which now resides major air strips.

Coinciding with this obvious aggression in claiming for itself portions of international territorial waters are acts of provocation against other nations’ vessels—including those of the United states. Chinese aircraft from these man-made islands almost routinely harass even American ships as they traverse these supposedly free, international waterways.

The following news excerpt further enlightens.

In its annual report to Congress on China’s military activities in 2015, the U.S. Defense Department estimated that China’s reclamation work had added more than 3,200 acres (1,300 hectares) of land on seven features it occupied in the Spratly Islands in the space of two years…

The report comes at a time of heightened tension over maritime territories claimed by China and disputed by several Asian nations. Washington has accused Beijing of militarizing the South China Sea while Beijing, in turn, has criticized increased U.S. naval patrols and exercises in Asia.

The Pentagon report said China was focusing on developing capabilities to counter outside intervention in any conflict…

(Reuters, www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-pentagon-idUSKCN0Y42J1)

This is the same China that threatened to bring its hordes into the Korean peninsula in support of the North Koreans during the Korean conflict. It was even willing to go to nuclear war with the West if the North Korean regime looked to be losing, according to reports back then. Now China is acting like the peacemaker, even set to discipline its rabid North Korean pet, if necessary to preserve world stability.

Why the present level of civil comportment, despite the tremendous military threat it is building to intimidate?

To my way of thinking, the answer to the schizophrenia that afflicts its leadership is that China is exerting extraordinary patience for very special reasons. We are paying to outfit the army of 200 million we read about in Bible prophecy and in accounts from news sources that tell us China and its Asian allies could easily outfit such a military juggernaut today.

A just released decision by a governing, international authority tells the current state of China’s attempt at regional hegemony.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A tribunal ruled in a sweeping decision Tuesday that China has no legal basis for its vast claims in the South China Sea and had aggravated the seething regional dispute with its extensive construction of artificial islands that destroyed coral reefs and infringed on the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone.

China immediately rejected the arbitration findings, and their impact remained unclear as there is no policing agency or mechanism to enforce them.

While the ruling cannot reverse China’s actions, it still constitutes a rebuke, carrying with it the force of the international community’s opinion.

Even so, they are confident–I believe their patience shows—that they will recoup their losses when they one day have enough, in terms of superior military assets, to become bill collectors on an unprecedented scale. We begin to see how even the kings of the East–as inscrutable as that part of the world is—fit into the end-times prophetic puzzle.