Michael Pillsbury, a former US Department of Defence official, said in 2014 that Washington had "funded millions of dollars of programmes" targeting Hong Kong through the NED.

There are echoes of hawkish Trump adviser Michael Pillsbury’s warnings of Beijing’s grand ambitions in The Hundred-Year Marathonas Doshi’s book details how China’s strategic efforts in recent years have been the most assertive phase in a decades-long strategy to displace the US, dating back to the end of the Cold War.

For example, Michael Pillsbury, the leading authority on China according to former US president Donald Trump, believes the size of China’s economy will be triple that of the US by 2049 and that China will turn the US into a colony.

"Pillsbury is a knowledgeable hawk with an interest in Chinese history and culture. Unlike ignorant China hawks in the US, Pillsbury has a passion for understanding China" said Lu Xiang, a senior fellow Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Michael Pillsbury, an adviser to Trump on China issues, said in September that if the trade talks failed the president could increase the tariffs on Chinese goods to “50 per cent or 100 per cent”.

“It was very close and then something mysterious happened. China reneged,” Pillsbury said. “The mystery is the hardliners [in Beijing]. They apparently were not aware of the 150-page deal. They somehow became aware of it in April. Some new players got involved in Beijing and next thing we know their reneging took place.”