The UK Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament in the UK has published its report on China. A summary is provided below, but in essence the report accepts that communist China has infiltrated every aspect of UK society. It has, for example exerted strong influence upon the UK universities, so that criticism of the CCP is carefully controlled. As well, using its vast financial resources it has bought up strategic assets, in education and industry.
Beyond all this though, China has intelligence capacities far beyond the UK, having, as a communist society a “whole of state’ approach. “In practice, this means that Chinese state-owned and non-state-owned companies, as well as academic and cultural establishments and ordinary Chinese citizens, are liable to be (willingly or unwillingly) co-opted into espionage and interference operations overseas: much of the impact that China has on national security is overt – through its economic might, its takeovers and mergers, its interaction with Academia and Industry – as opposed to covert activity carried out by its intelligence officers.”
Overall, the same assessment can be made for most nations in the West, especially Australia and New Zealand, who have allowed their once sense of national unity and homogeneity to be crippled by multiculturalism, and defence weakened by the philosophy of woke and diversity.
https://nakedemperor.substack.com/p/chinas-whole-of-state-threat
“Today, the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament in the UK published its report on China. This considers the overall intelligence threat from China to the UK and the Government’s response to that threat. The report says that it is clear that China has taken advantage of the policy of successive British Governments to boost economic ties between the UK and China, which has enabled it to advance its commercial, science and technology, and industrial goals in order to gain a strategic advantage.
It is a long 222 page document so I will just post a few interesting snippets here but I recommend opening it up to have a more thorough read.
The ‘whole-of-state’ threat
- China almost certainly maintains the largest state intelligence apparatus in the world – dwarfing the UK’s Intelligence Community and presenting a challenge for our Agencies to cover. As a result, our Agencies’ work has to be targeted on those aspects that are most damaging. However, the problem is compounded by China’s ‘whole-of-state’ approach. In practice, this means that Chinese state-owned and non-state-owned companies, as well as academic and cultural establishments and ordinary Chinese citizens, are liable to be (willingly or unwillingly) co-opted into espionage and interference operations overseas: much of the impact that China has on national security is overt – through its economic might, its takeovers and mergers, its interaction with Academia and Industry – as opposed to covert activity carried out by its intelligence officers.
- China’s size, ambition and capability have enabled it to successfully penetrate every sector of the UK’s economy, and – until the Covid-19 pandemic – Chinese money was readily accepted by HMG with few questions asked…China has been buying up and seeking to control or influence the UK’s Industry and Energy sectors: we have already mentioned China’s interest in the UK’s Civil Nuclear sector.
- China has been particularly effective at using its money and influence to penetrate or buy Academia in order to ensure that its international narrative is advanced and criticism of China supressed. This helps to reinforce the CCP’s narrative and gives its international posture external credibility – helping it on its way to becoming a world power.
- China’s attempts to influence the international narrative can also be seen clearly in its response to the recent Covid-19 pandemic…Further, it appears positioned to capitalise on the damage to world economies and may well emerge from the pandemic stronger than before – and certainly stronger relative to many other countries that have suffered from the pandemic.
Threat and Response
- China’s national imperative is to ensure that the Chinese Communist Party remains in power. Everything else is subservient to that.
- However, it is its ambition at a global level – to become a technological and economic superpower, on which other countries are reliant – that poses a national security threat to the UK.
- China views the UK through the optic of the struggle between the United States and China. When combined with the UK’s membership of significant international bodies, and the perception of the UK as an international opinion-former, these factors would appear to place the UK just below China’s top priority targets.
- China views the UK as being of use in its efforts to mute international criticism and to gain economically: this, in the short term at least, will temper China’s targeting of the UK.
- China is seeking both political influence and economic advantage in order to achieve its aims in relation to the UK. It seeks to acquire information and influence elites and decision-makers, and to acquire Intellectual Property using covert and overt methods to gain technological supremacy.
- China almost certainly maintains the largest state intelligence apparatus in the world. The nature and scale of the Chinese Intelligence Services are – like many aspects of China’s government – hard to grasp for the outsider, due to the size of the bureaucracy, the blurring of lines of accountability between party and state officials, a partially decentralised system, and a lack of verifiable information.
- The Chinese Intelligence Services target the UK and its overseas interests prolifically and aggressively. While they seek to obtain classified information, they are willing to utilise intelligence officers and agents to collect open source information indiscriminately – given the vast resources at their disposal. In more ways than one, the broad remit of the Chinese Intelligence Services poses a significant challenge to Western attempts to counter their activity.
- To compound the problem, it is not just the Chinese Intelligence Services: the Chinese Communist Party co-opts every state institution, company and citizen. This ‘whole-of-state’ approach means China can aggressively target the UK, yet the scale of the activity makes it more difficult to detect ***.
- In terms of espionage, China’s human intelligence collection is prolific, using a vast network of individuals embedded in local society to access individuals of interest – often identified through social media. It is also clear from the evidence we have seen that China routinely targets current and former UK civil servants ***. While there is good awareness of the danger posed, it is vital that vigilance is maintained.
- Decision-makers – from serving politicians to former political figures, senior government officials and the military – are, inevitably, key targets. China employs a range of tactics, including seeking to recruit them into lucrative roles in Chinese companies – to the extent that we questioned whether there was a revolving door between the Government and certain Chinese companies, with those involved in awarding contracts being ‘rewarded’ with jobs.
- It is nevertheless concerning that the security community, and the Government in general, were aware of many of these issues several years ago and yet we are only now beginning to see the introduction of measures taken to protect UK sovereign interests. The lack of action to protect our assets from a known threat was a serious failure, and one from which the UK may feel the consequences for years to come.
Case Studies
- The UK’s academic institutions provide a rich feeding ground for China to achieve political influence in the UK and economic advantage over the UK. China exerts influence over institutions, individual UK academics and Chinese students in order to control the narrative of debate about China – including through the use of Confucius Institutes in the UK – and it directs or steals UK academic research to obtain Intellectual Property in order to build, or short-cut to, Chinese expertise. However, the academic sector has not received sufficient advice on, or protection from, either.
- In its quest for economic advantage, China often acts in plain sight – directing, funding and collaborating on academic research for its own ends. In particular, it seeks to benefit the Chinese military through research on dual-use technologies, which is often unclassified in its early stages. There is a question as to whether academic institutions are alive to the threat posed by such collaboration, particularly given that they often accept transfer of Information Data and Intellectual Property as a condition of funding. While some have expressed concern, others seem to be turning a blind eye, happy simply to take the money.
- The vast number of Chinese students – particularly post-graduates – in academic institutions in the UK that are involved in cutting-edge research must therefore raise concerns, given the access and opportunities they are afforded.
- Unlike other countries, such as the United States (US), the UK has taken no preventative action. This is particularly concerning, as US restrictions on Chinese students will make UK institutions more attractive to those seeking to gain Intellectual Property and expertise.
- China is seeking technological dominance over the West and is targeting the acquisition of Intellectual Property and data in ten key industrial sectors in which the Chinese Communist Party intends China to become a world leader – many of which are fields where the UK has particular expertise.
- Without swift and decisive action, we are on a trajectory for the nightmare scenario where China steals blueprints, sets standards and builds products, exerting political and economic influence at every step. Such prevalence in every part of the supply chain will mean that, in the export of its goods or services, China will have a pliable vehicle through which it can also export its values. This presents a serious commercial challenge, but also has the potential to pose an existential threat to liberal democratic systems.
- The Government would be naïve to assume that allowing Chinese companies to exert influence over the UK’s Civil Nuclear and Energy sectors is not ceding control to the Chinese Communist Party.
- We have serious concerns about the incentive and opportunity for espionage that Chinese involvement in the UK’s Civil Nuclear sector provides.
- Although Chinese involvement in, and control over, UK nuclear power stations is deeply concerning, it offers only a small snapshot of the attempt to gain control over a range of sectors, and technologies, by an increasingly assertive China.
- Now is not the time to try to reach conclusions about Chinese intent or actions over the origins and development of the pandemic – it is still too soon, as it is likely that more information will come to light about Covid-19 as investigations continue.
- The key issue for the future is the extent to which China will now capitalise on the pandemic as other countries suffer its effects and how the UK Intelligence Community and their allies will stop this growing threat.
- Yet even now, with the country having fully reopened, we continue to see the Intelligence Community working partially from home (some more than others). It appears that the response to our requests for information has slowed dramatically as a result: the ‘new normal’ for some organisations means deadlines have been missed or responses have been sanitised to enable them to be sent from home. This has had – and continues to have – an impact on the Committee’s ability to scrutinise security and intelligence issues properly and in a timely fashion.
- The pandemic had a notable impact in terms of staff across the Intelligence Community working from home, without continual access to classified systems – other than for those working on the most critical priorities.