To add to that - putting aside the present state of Sino-US relations, our prior beliefs should reflect what academic work on lying in politics tells us (1): *

To add to that - putting aside the present state of Sino-US relations, our prior beliefs should reflect what academic work on lying in politics tells us (1): * lying in official diplomatic relationships between countries is rather rare * within countries, democratic leaders are much more likely to lie to their population than autocrats * countries with imperial ambitions and long-distance ventures lie more often than others * within great powers, the depiction of the rival great powers is especially lie-ridden In other words, for a person living in the US - it's likely that whatever US news sources tell you about China (or Russia) is mostly lies or exaggerations (1) https://www.oxonianreview.org/wp/international-deceit/ https://www.oxonianreview.org/wp/international-deceit/