US lawmakers launched a sweeping, potentially two-year investigation into their country’s strategic competition with China on Tuesday night, with testimony from Chinese human rights activists and former US national security advisers.
The initiation of the investigation came two weeks after the United States to shoot down a Chinese surveillance balloon off the coast of South Carolina.
“This is an existential fight about what life will be like in the 21st century, and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake,” said Republican Congressman Mike Gallagher, chairman of the 24-member House Select Committee on Strategic Competition with China. members.
“The Chinese Communist Party is pinpointed to its vision of the future, a world replete with techno-totalitarian, surveillance states, where human rights will be subservient to the whims of the party,” Gallagher said.
Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, the top Democrat on the committee, stressed the need for bipartisan cooperation.
“We must recognize that the Chinese Communist Party wants us to be rebellious, partisan and biased,” Krishnamoorthi said. “In fact, the CCP expects it. But what they don’t understand is that the diversity of our views and backgrounds is not a bug in America’s operating system. It is our defining characteristic and strength.”
Former national security advisers who served during the administration of President Donald Trump (2017-2021) warned lawmakers at Tuesday’s hearing that the United States must catch up with China.
“The United States and other nations of the free world supported the erosion of their competitive advantages by transferring capital and technology to a strategic competitor,” former White House National Security Adviser HR McMaster told the committee.
President Joe Biden said earlier this year that the United States is in “competition” with China, not “conflict.” But witnesses told the panel that Beijing views the relationship differently.
“There’s really no excuse anymore for being fooled by Beijing’s intentions,” said former deputy homeland security adviser Matthew Pottinger. “And the canon of President Xi Jingpin’s publicly available statements is too voluminous, and his regime’s cumulative actions too brazen, to be misconstrued at this late hour.”
Purchase of land in the US
The committee’s broad exploration will allow new perspectives on security threats. Republican Congressman Dan Newhouse told the voice of america that he is concerned about Chinese purchases of land in agricultural areas of the United States.
“Can you imagine anything more precarious than having our food supply, perhaps just one link in that food supply chain, engaged in potential conflict with someone who is not our friend?” said Newhouse, who is co-sponsoring food legislation. issue.
Committee members also told the VOA that China’s surveillance balloon is only a small part of the security threat.
“It’s literally on Americans’ phones every day, and the threat doesn’t end there: China is a massive military threat,” said Republican Congressman Dusty Johnson. “Its navy is larger, and many argue more powerful, than the United States. They have more ICBM launchers than the United States. Its capabilities and aspects like hypersonics far exceed what the United States is today.”
While the first hearing focused on security concerns, the committee’s work is expected to address a wide range of issues in the relationship, from economic and agricultural competition to origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The committee is considering hearings outside the Capitol to see firsthand the potential threats to critical infrastructure.
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