This article was originally published by Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse Blog.
It takes a lot to blow me away in this day and age, but the video footage of humanoid AI-powered robots in China that I am about to share with you truly blew me away. During the CCTV Spring Festival gala, humanoid AI-powered robots built by Unitree performed an incredibly complex martial arts routine that was simply jaw-dropping.
I never thought that we would get to a point where robots could move like that. I am literally in awe of what the Chinese have been able to accomplish. What made the performance even more incredible is that large numbers of human children were also involved in the performance…
Dozens of Unitree bots took to the stage at the CCTV Spring Festival gala, which is China’s most–watched TV show.
Wearing red vests, the robots performed kicks, flips, and even moves with nunchucks, swords, and poles.
Amazingly, their daring performance took place just metres away from human children performers.
If even one of the robots had made a mistake while swinging a weapon around, the child performers could have potentially been seriously hurt.
But there were no mistakes.
The footage that is posted below looks like it could have come out of a science fiction movie, but I assure you that this is very real…
Needless to say, U.S. companies haven’t built anything remotely similar yet.
Last year, Unitree rolled out a bunch of clunky robots that twirled handkerchiefs around, and that was considered to be impressive at the time.
But the jump in sophistication that we witnessed in this year’s performance was truly monumental…
The contrast with last year’s show was clear. In 2025, Unitree’s humanoids performed a folk Yangko dance, twirling handkerchiefs. This year, the machines executed aerial flips, table-vaulting parkour, continuous single-leg flips, and a 7.5-rotation airflare spin.
“It’s been just one year — and the performance jump is striking,” Georg Stieler, Asia managing director and head of robotics and automation at technology consultancy Stieler, told NBC News. He added that the robots’ motion control reflects advances in their AI “brains,” enabling fine motor skills useful in real-world factory settings.
If AI “brains” are this sophisticated now, what would they be like five or ten years in the future?
The Chinese already use more robots in their factories than the rest of the world combined.
As AI-powered robots become even more proficient at a whole host of tasks, where do human workers fit into the equation?
We might want to start thinking about that.
We also might want to start thinking about what future wars will look like.
It is getting easier to imagine entire armies of AI-powered robots killing everything in sight.
And the advances that China is making in drone warfare are truly impressive…
Central to drone warfare is the ability to orchestrate mass sorties of UAVs. Known as swarm attacks, the tactic is particularly difficult to defend against using conventional weapons systems, forcing militaries to experiment with novel defense systems ranging from high powered microwave weapons to advanced laser guns. In addition to evolving defense tactics, swarm technologies poses difficult questions for engineers looking to better coordinate drones. A key question concerns organizing their behavior, namely, how to create a sense of awareness between weapons systems. According to a January 2026 report by The Wall Street Journal, researchers in China have turned towards the animal kingdom to teach drones how to hunt and evade potential targets, soliciting the behavior of hawks, wolves, and coyotes into their AI systems.
The development points to broader trends in Beijing’s drone development program. With dual-purpose economic and research infrastructure, Beijing has utilized its robust manufacturing wing to generate high-tech drones efficiently and more cost-effectively than other countries. With a chokehold on global commercial drone production, China is leading this global revolution, potentially posing major consequences for both its rivals and warfare more broadly.
How can you defend against vast numbers of ultra-sophisticated AI-powered drones that hunt in large swarms?
All of the old paradigms are going out the window.
The conflicts of the future will look completely different from the conflicts of the past.
If we fall behind, we are going to be in so much trouble.
Right now, the United States and China are engaged in a frenzied race for AI dominance.
What OpenAI and Anthropic have been able to achieve over the past year has been amazing, but Chinese tech companies continue to roll out brand new AI models as well…
China is ringing in the Lunar New Year with a flurry of new artificial intelligence (AI) model launches. Tech companies, such as Alibaba, ByteDance, and Zhipu, have all announced new product launches in the weeks leading up to China’s biggest holiday, while industry watchers expect a new Deepseek model soon.
China is widely regarded as a major competitor to the United States in the race to adopt and develop artificial intelligence models.
Some experts are suggesting that, as we are so focused on winning the race for AI dominance, we are missing the larger threat.
One expert is warning that if AI technology continues to grow at an exponential rate, we could soon be facing a scenario in which ultra-intelligent AI entities rebel against humanity and overpower us…
Tech CEOs are locked in an artificial intelligence “arms race” that risks wiping out humanity, top computer science researcher Stuart Russell told AFP on Tuesday, calling for governments to pull the brakes.
Russell, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, said the heads of the world’s biggest AI companies understand the dangers posed by super-intelligent systems that could one day overpower humans.
Ten years ago, anyone who said anything like this would have been considered a loon.
But not anymore.
Russell really does believe that we are allowing these AI companies to “essentially play Russian roulette with every human being on earth”…
“For governments to allow private entities to essentially play Russian roulette with every human being on earth is, in my view, a total dereliction of duty,” said Russell, a prominent voice on AI safety.
Of course, we shouldn’t just be concerned about an AI rebellion.
A human could potentially use ultra-advanced AI entities to impose global tyranny on a scale that we have never seen before in human history.
In a world where AI can literally watch, monitor, track, and control everything that is going on in society, where could you hide?
We have truly entered very dangerous territory, but there is no way that the tech companies are going to turn back now.
Michael’s new book, entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next,” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.
About the Author: Michael Snyder’s new book, entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next,” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written nine other books that are available on Amazon.com, including “Chaos”, “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. When you purchase any of Michael’s books, you help to support the work that he is doing. You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter. Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream, and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites. These are such troubled times, and people need hope. John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.
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