How President Xi Jinping is transforming China at home and abroad

Nick Schifrin:

And that strength is also the military. Xi calls for China to — quote — "stand tall in the East." He evokes memories of the Middle Kingdom, a term to describe China's centuries-long role as an international power.

Xi has dramatically modernized China's army, Navy and Air Force, and opened up China's first overseas base. And, most controversially, China claims almost all of the South China Sea, and has created military outposts, flouting U.S. objections and international law.

Xi Jinping's China flexes that muscular foreign policy on the world stage and the silver screen. "Wolf Warrior 2" is China's highest-grossing film of all time. Star and director Wu Jing plays Leng Feng, a special operations forces soldier who wins the day for the Chinese military.

When he's no longer a soldier, trouble comes to him. He becomes a rogue hero, launching a seeming suicide mission against the bad guys and teaming up with fellow Chinese to save the day again.

If a story about a former-soldier-turned-vigilante who uses bows and arrows and takes a ride in a tank sounds familiar, it is. At the height of the Cold War, the U.S. had John Rambo.

Wu Jing asks, why can't the Chinese have their own heroes?

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