China Insider | 2026 Shangri-La Dialogue, China Penalizes Overseas Brokerage Firms, KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun’s Begins US Visit
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In this week’s episode of China Insider, Miles Yu covers remarks given by US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth at this year’s Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, and what his statements reveal about the current objectives of US defense strategy in the Indo-Pacific. Next, Miles reviews China’s decision to impose significant penalties on several brokerage firms over alleged trading infractions, and how this move fits into China’s global economic coercion apparatus. Finally, Miles unpacks KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun’s planned visit to the US, what we can expect from this tour, and the potential impact her visit may have on current cross-strait tensions.
China Insider is a weekly podcast project from Hudson Institute’s China Center, hosted by China Center Director and Senior Fellow, Dr. Miles Yu, who provides weekly news that mainstream American outlets often miss, as well as in-depth commentary and analysis on the China challenge and the free world’s future.
Welcome to China Insider, a podcast from the Hudson Institute's China Center. I'm Miles Yu, Senior Fellow and Director of the China Center. Join me each week for our analysis of the major events concerning China, China threat, and their implications to the U.S. and beyond. It's Tuesday, June 2nd, and we have three topics this week. First, we cover remarks from U.S. Secretary Pete Hegseath at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore from over the weekend, and what the dialogue reveals about the evolving U.S. defense strategy toward China in the Indo-Pacific. Next, we review China's decision to impose penalties on several brokerage firms over alleged trading infractions in the mainland, and how this move fits into China's ongoing global economic coercion apparatus. Finally, we discuss KMT Chairwoman Chung Lee One's planned visit to the U.S. and what to expect from this tour and potential impact on cross-strait relations dialogue. Miles, great to see you again. How you doing this week? This was good, as always. Glad to be with you again, Colin. Glad to hear, glad to hear. So, up first today, we cover the latest updates from this year's Shangri-La Dialogue held in Singapore. The annual dialogue is hosted by the International Institute for Strategic Studies and convenes the Greater Indo-Pacific Regions preeminent defense and security forum, bringing together leaders from across the region and world to discuss shared international security challenges and responses. So, returning to this year's dialogue, U.S. Secretary Pete Hegseath provided remarks for what the current state of U.S. policy and defense posture in the Indo-Pacific region is. So, before we get too far into the weeds, what were the key highlights from the Secretary's speech and anything that stood out to you in particular compared to his comments from prior year's dialogues? This is actually very striking because to me, this speech was very strong and the message is very strong. But there's some kind of domestic debate here in the U.S. about the tone and tenor of that speech. Let me just analyze that a little bit later. But before we go on to before we reach that point, let me just say a few words about Shangri-La. Shangri-La, obviously, is dialogue, is defense dialogue. It's the most important and most prominent Indo-Pacific security forum. Normally, you have like three to four dozens of countries sending their top defense officials, mostly defense ministers to go there. This year is no exception. 44 countries send their defense chiefs to Shangri-La in Singapore. So, this is actually a very important policy, a posturing declaration, and a dialogue. PKSTF, our Secretary of the War, went there and to deliver, I think, his very strong speech because it did not deviate away from the one central pillar of the Trump second administration's agenda. That is deterrence. Deterrence means one thing, that is to deter China. So, that is very important because China has been designated by demonstration before this one and the first Trump administration as the number one national security threat, bar now. So, that is basically the mission of this visit and that was the message. So, back to the question you asked me about the key takeaways. You know, it did not really say as many words as China in his speech, but every single paragraph to stress American's conviction, commitment, and determination to keep Indo-Pacific safe peace against and hegemony is about China. So, on several occasions, he specifically named China. So, that is a pretty, you know, in addition, he also made a very strong appeal and demonstrated, actually Americans resolved to work with not just, you know, the countries directly bullied by China, namely Taiwan, the Philippines. Also, he made an extra effort to meet and have extensive consultation with his counterpart from UK and Australia and Japan. So, and the Philippines, of course. So, this is a very important thing. And I think, you know, particularly with Japan, the Japanese Defense Minister, Mr. Koi Zhumi, he's a very pointed and it's a very uncharacteristic of Japanese usual, polite confrontation, non-confrontational style. Basically, you know, Marc Chinese claim that there's a neo-militaryism in Japan. And so, the message is a very strong deterrence against China and continue US presence in Indo-Pacific. But in the meantime, he also stressed the Trump, President Trump's desire to avoid direct US-China military confrontation, but if a confrontation arises and the Secretary of Texas makes it very clear that US is going to
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