It could still turn out well for China. It’s just that this risk should be mentioned. Otherwise it’s easy to believe that Chinas win here is inevitable.
Domestic debt (in the country's own currency) behaves differently from foreign debt.
Domestic one is the kind that is actually never paid out, unless the government does something very stupid.
China has other kinds of problems, and the article has the same kind of simplistic mercantilist view of the world that journalists seem very adept to and that the current US government is applying. So, while there are stuff to be said about them, you won't get anything of value here.
USA is alienating everyone including Canada.
So who wins that game?
(1) Chinese debt is internal.
(2) China is still ideologically communist authoritarian nation with market economy.
They can fix thing by fiat. No need to think about legal issues or respect property right. They can give X% haircut for bad debt, or freeze debt payments for 5 years for debts they think are destabilizing the economy. They don't have to give same treatment to all debt.
Demographics is the problem for China in long term, not debt.
Billionaires wants them here, not poor people.
Given poor people are more dependent on welfare and social security (having no plan B, like wealthy folks do), they should be the ones most in favor of population (and therefore economic) growth.
Which means they're doing their part to support 30% of state budgets, in addition to the businesses they're working for who are paying their own taxes.
Ergo, poor people should be in favor of any sort of immigration.