If for any reason they are not able to get their goods from China they will collapse like a house of cards.
This is incorrect. Wal-Mart owes it success primarily to the fact that it was able to take advantage of several ongoing developments that heavily influenced the retail industry over the last 25 years:
1. They were first major retailer to take advantage of the most important advance in the freight shipping industry since World War II -- the advent of containerized shipping. This more than anything else is what made it extremely cost-effective to ship most finished products long distances around the globe.
2. Their most robust growth period coincided with an era when America was becoming increasingly suburbanized and when fuel had become very inexpensive (in relative terms). These two factors combined to make big-box retail centers the most cost-effective venue for the retail industry, replacing the regional shopping mall concept that had dominated the industry since the 1950s.
3. They've developed the most efficient methods of delivering products from their point of origin to their point of sale. Wal-Mart has built enormous (4+ million square feet) distribution centers in places where nothing existed before they arrived, which tells me that they've got a pretty unique approach to warehousing and distribution.
Wal-Mart owes its success to being the first retailer to source in a big way from China.
Kind of like Bill and Hillary, but legal.