Project 2025 wasn't really secret but it wasn't in the public consciousness until about a year later https://trends.google.com/explore?q=project%20202&date=today...
China also has a bunch of political philosophy nerds that crank out wonky policy papers. I keep finding references to this one by Wu Bikang, https://www.rmlt.com.cn/2014/0403/253621.shtml
I'm still very bad at Chinese and I don't assume that I understand that paper well, even with translations, but that paper clearly interprets the Thucydides trap very differently from how it's discussed here.