I wonder if they manufacture their weapons systems with the same level of quality that the rest of their junk has. It's tough to take pride in your work when it's done at gunpoint.
Read a post by an engineer who said the Three Gorges Dam should never have been built and could collapse at any given moment. That in and of itself could turn China into a memory.
I think if something is high profile enough they do it very well. The Beijing airport (international terminal) was nice and the Beijing subway system was maybe the best one I’ve ever ridden on (with announcements in Chinese + English). But, yes, shoddy is definitely the norm. They often don’t realize how shoddy things are. I was shown a dorm that obviously was infested with mold and smelled, but they acted like they had a lot of pride in it.
Another thing is that a lot of Chinese are acutely aware of how repressive the Government is. After I went to China, we had a contingent of their faculty visit our University. For almost all of these, it was their first time in America. I think the differences shocked them.
Finally, the Chinese (really Asians in general) have a reputation for being orderly. Nothing is further from the truth. You see this early on when they cut in lines. Their traffic is extremely chaotic too—and dangerous. A common sight is a family of 3 people riding on a single electric scooter with NO helmets.