China’s Military Robots Could Outpace America

Armed robodogs appeared alongside

Serbian

soldiers in training, just weeks after the announcement of a Sino–Serbian partnership to produce 3,000 humanoid and quadruped robots annually in Serbia.

They have also made appearances in training alongside Chinese and

Cambodian

soldiers. Chinese soldiers used them during beach landings that could be training for an invasion of Taiwan.

On Sept. 14, a new

robofish

capable of underwater surveillance was unveiled by a

military

-linked company in Beijing. The company offers shark- and medium-sized robofish options. Both could potentially deliver explosives to the underside of ships.

In August, a Chinese defense contractor revealed what appear to be humanoid robots equipped with riot control gear. The same month, Chinese humanoid robots

beat

two world records held by humans—the

100-meter dash

and the high-jump.

International companies and universities aid China’s robotics explosion, which directly serves its military and threatens democracies globally.

China’s

private companies (though nothing is fully private in China) and defense contractors have

reverse-engineered

and otherwise built upon U.S. military-

funded

and academic robotics breakthroughs, which were naively and openly published.

The evidence points to Huawei’s theft of robotics technology from T-Mobile as far back as

2012

. Other robotics tech is freely shared or sold to Chinese companies, which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) can then order to be shared more generally among China’s robotics researchers and manufacturers.

The Robot Operating System (ROS) was first developed by the

Stanford

University Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, for example, but since it is open source, it has been adopted by the Chinese robotics community. Open-source training data and simulation tools are also freely shared by academics worldwide with Chinese military researchers under CCP control.

In 2016, China’s Midea appliance manufacturer sought to acquire one of several leading global industrial robotics companies. It ultimately paid an almost 60 percent premium to purchase a controlling share in Germany’s

Kuka

. The company’s valuation increased to about $5 billion with the sale. At the time, Kuka provided robotic services to a U.S. military aircraft assembly line, among many other industrial uses.

In

California,

Kuka contributed to a moving assembly line that included “automated drill and countersink machines, automated coating application systems, and moving assembly lines [that] resulted in significant cost reductions, quality improvements and safety enhancements,” according to George “Nick” Bullen, an aerospace consultant.

That unit was

carved

out of the sale, but some of Kuka’s aerospace expertise likely leaked into China anyway. Berlin said there was no national security risk and greenlit the deal to avoid upsetting Beijing, on which German auto manufacturers depend for exports.

Now, Kuka is part of what arguably gives China a commanding lead in industrial and military robotics. In 2021, Kuka reportedly established a joint venture with the

Chinese

military contractor, Chongqing Chang’an Industry Group, to form an intelligent robotics company.

Two years later, China’s primary state-owned

satellite

manufacturer was reportedly using KUKA robots to manufacture satellites in Wuhan. China’s rapidly scaling satellite

constellation

production has negative national security implications for the United States and U.S. allies.

In August, China’s state-owned defense corporation,

Norinco

, released a visual of its Fuxi humanoid robot. The Fuxi can conduct surveillance and, what appears from the visual, crowd control. The visual shows three synchronized humanoid robots with riot shields and raised batons.

Perfecting the military use of humanoid and canine robotics requires not just the hardware of densely packed motors, gears, and actuators in each robot, but also extensive data to fine-tune how that hardware interacts with the physical environment. Human

trainers

are capturing information using head-mounted cameras, radar, motion-capture suits, and haptic gloves that measure pressure and touch.

Within five or ten years, according to analysts, China’s combat troops may increasingly use humanoid and canine

robots

for clearing tunnels, buildings, and ships of enemy combatants. Where tracked robots and drones cannot go, humanoid and canine robots may eventually beat humans in battle. They must overcome the better

endurance

of humans and wheeled robots, but when they do, they will have advantages in agility and power.

China’s military is already

calling

on robot developers to move their robots from laboratory development to military training grounds.

China’s robotics ecosystem is likely better positioned to produce combat robots than U.S. industry is, due to its

scale

, flexibility, government subsidies, and lower manufacturing costs. Its robotics factories are allegedly designed to shift between building different types of robots, some of which help build new robots.

In the first seven months of 2026, according to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, the country produced more than 635,000 industrial robots. Some of the humanoids walked themselves off the factory floor. China dominates the

global

market for humanoid robots, with about 95 percent of international shipments last year.