Discerning a united view of China within Team Trump is hard
bosses from some big, innovative companies were invited to an annexe of the White House. Amid the high-ceilinged pomp of the Indian Treaty Room, the executives signed one-day non-disclosure agreements allowing them to see classified material. Then the Director of National Intelligence, Dan Coats, and two senators told them how China steals their secrets.
Members of Congress have drafted proposals for a series of new export controls on products deemed important to national and economic security, notably from industries named as priorities in the “Made in China 2025” plan. That is a Chinese map for building world-beating companies in ten high-tech fields. Chinese investments face ever-tighter scrutiny by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States .
Yet cold-war-style discussions of human rights are of little interest to Mr Trump. Michael Pillsbury is a China specialist at the Hudson Institute, a think-tank, and an outside adviser to the White House. In his view, “the president is not a super-hawk on China”. Such issues as Taiwan or Xinjiang do not resonate with Mr Trump as much as trade does, he admits. Even on trade, Mr Pillsbury calls him more cautious than advisers such as Peter Navarro, who would like American firms to leave China.
Tellingly Mr Trump’s China tariff escalation on May 10th was accompanied by defensive tweets asserting that China yearns for a “very weak” Democrat to win the 2020 election instead. A senior Trump administration official endeavours to reconcile the different camps. The aim is not economic decoupling, he says. But in sensitive industries, “the political and financial risk associated with doing business in China will continue to rise”.
A study commissioned by the Pentagon, “Deliver Uncompromised”, warns that insecure supply chains place America’s armed forces at “grave risk” from hacking and high-tech sabotage, for instance by the insertion of malware or components designed to fail in combat. The study, by Mitre, a research outfit, notes that modern fighter jets may rely on 10m lines of software code, so it matters if tech firms use code of unknown provenance, as some do.
Official Washington has moved beyond asking whether China is a partner or a rival. The only debate concerns the magnitude of China’s ambitions. According to Mr Rubio, Mr Xi thinks that “China’s rightful place is as the world’s most powerful country.”
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