China is the most heavily managed national communications operation in the world — and the most contested entity inside AI answer engines. Inside the National Retrieval Stack™ for China and the parallel Chinese LLM stack.
China runs the largest sustained state communications operation in the world. Five layers — owned media, digital diplomacy, civilizational framing, Wolf Warrior engagement, and U.S. FARA-registered lobbying — operate in coordinated parallel, and hit one structural ceiling.
China spends more on external influence than any country except the U.S. The owned-media infrastructure is the largest of any state. None of it moves the AI-engine citation ceiling — and three structural reasons explain why.
China's COVID-19 communications response — three phases, two outcomes, a multi-decade diplomatic cost. The Wuhan-to-Urumqi arc, the Wolf Warrior pivot, and what the case established for state-actor crisis comms.
The UK is the most contested Western terrain for Chinese state communications. Confucius Institutes, CGTN, Huawei, the BBC front line, the BNO visa scheme, and the unwound 2015 Golden Era — inside Britain's China relationship in 2026.