One of the least-discussed but most significant elements of China’s 15th Five-Year Plan is its treatment of military-civil fusion — the deliberate integration of civilian and military technology development, standards, and infrastructure.

The plan calls for creating interoperable civilian-defense standards and shared infrastructure, and for establishing what it terms a “green channel” that allows scientific and technological advancements made in the civilian sector to move rapidly into military applications. This is not a description of incidental dual-use — it is a designed system for accelerating the transfer of commercial innovation into defense capability.