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“What we’re seeing right now is a China which is lashing out at everybody,” said China analyst Gordon Chang.
In addition to its encroachments on Hong Kong and the first fatal border clash with India in 45 years, “you’ve got the boat bumping and other incidents in the South China Sea, East China Sea; the increased tempo of dangerous intercepts of the U.S. Navy in the global commons; the repeated threats to invade Taiwan; all of these hostile words, these disinformation campaigns directed against the United States and others,” Chang said.
The Chinese communist regime has become increasingly belligerent globally, and it “believes it can do what it wants,” Chang said, in an interview with The Epoch Times for the “American Thought Leaders” program.
“We have to teach China for the first time that our warnings actually mean something,” Chang said.
To him, the current situation resembles the late 1930s, when Nazi Germany became increasingly brazen, remilitarizing its Rhineland border with France in violation of the Treaty of Versailles, annexing Austria, taking over Czechoslovakia, and demanding territory from Lithuania and Poland.
“We get to the summer of 1939. Hitler is threatening to invade Poland,” while Britain and France warn that they would declare war on Germany. “We know from the German archives that Hitler didn’t believe London and Paris. And why should he?” Chang said. “They were issuing these series of warnings and not doing anything about it.”
Similarly, “the risk of miscalculation on the part of China is extremely high, especially because they have an aggressive leader,” Chang said. “This is an exceedingly dangerous time.”
A ‘Draconian’ National Security Law
On June 30, Beijing’s rubber-stamp parliament pushed through a national security law criminalizing secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign forces in Hong Kong. In effect, it “gives Beijing the right to do anything it wants,” Chang said.
“People say—and I think they’re right—that this is not just a law. This is the end of law,” Chang said.
After the law was passed, Beijing swiftly converted a skyscraper hotel into the headquarters of a powerful new state security agency, which can operate free of any constraints from Hong Kong law or local authorities. Some critics have likened it to the Gestapo.
It has issued new rules giving Hong Kong police broad new powers to implement the national security law, including “warrantless searches, freezing of assets; they can demand that internet companies remove content; they can demand that organizations outside of Hong Kong actually turn over material—though I don’t know how they’re going to enforce that. But nonetheless, its powers are extremely broad,” Chang said.
“And as we’re going to find out, its powers are going to get broader and broader over time.”
Relentless Attacks
While it stamps down on freedoms in Hong Kong, the Chinese regime is also engaging in a sustained campaign of espionage and subversion of the United States, Chang noted.
“Every single day, we’re subject to an existential challenge from China,” Chang said.
In a July 7 speech, FBI director Christopher Wray revealed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) opens a new China-related investigation about once every ten hours. Almost half of the FBI’s nearly 5,000 counterintelligence investigations are connected to China, he added, as the FBI counters the Chinese regime’s efforts to steal U.S. technology and influence U.S. policymakers.
Chinese IP theft costs the U.S. economy over $225 billion annually, and may amount to as much as $600 billion, according to a report by The Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property.
Chinese-owned apps like TikTok are facing increased scrutiny globally, as experts say they can be used to collect data for the Chinese Communist Party. According to Chinese law, all Chinese companies are obligated to cooperate with Chinese intelligence operations and hand over information if asked.
Security researchers have found TikTok secretly accessing the clipboard on Apple phones. This means TikTok is able to see any text a user copied onto the clipboard, including potentially sensitive information.
“All of this data that TikTok and other Chinese apps accumulate is then fed into China’s artificial intelligence systems,” Chang said. “The more data you put into an AI system, the better it will operate.”
Such information is also likely used by the regime to identify potential targets and vulnerabilities to exploit, Chang said.
In 2015, Chinese state-sponsored hackers stole 21.5 million background checks from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management on current and former employees. That same year, Chinese hackers breached the systems of healthcare giant Anthem, stealing the personal medical information of nearly 80 million Americans.
“China is relentlessly attacking American society,” Chang said. And “the only way to protect ourselves is to decouple.”
A Two-Faced Regime
On July 9, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi called for “peaceful coexistence” with the United States and said “China never intends to challenge or replace the U.S. and has no intention to engage in an all-out confrontation with the U.S.”
Chang wasn’t convinced. “This is always China’s line: That they want to cooperate. They believe in a shared humanity, all the rest of it.” But actions speak far louder than words, Chang said.
“We have seen unrelenting attacks on the American Republic and indeed on the international community as a whole,” Chang said.
Besides its aggression globally, the Chinese Communist Party is committing crimes against humanity against its own populace, from the Tibetans to the Uyghurs, Chang said. In Xinjiang, the regime has forced Uyghurs into abortion or sterilization procedures and imprisoned at least one million Uyghurs—atrocities that amount to genocide in Chang’s view.
“It’s important that the United States and other countries start to cut their relations with China because we cannot afford to deal with a regime like that,” Chang said.
The regime’s multi-week coverup of the coronavirus outbreak, which facilitated the spread of a devastating global pandemic, is further evidence that the Chinese authorities can never be trusted, in Chang’s view.
“I think the only way that China can regain the trust of the United States and the international community is to get rid of communism, and establish a multiparty democracy and a free economy,” Chang said.
“We want to work with China. We want to see China succeed and prosper. But we don’t want to see a militant regime take over the world.”
American Thought Leaders is an Epoch Times show available on Facebook and YouTube and The Epoch Times website.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
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