Written by “Classical Liberal”
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In March 2021, Nigel Farage resigned as leader of Reform UK and announced he was stepping back from frontline party politics permanently. He said he still planned to participate in political debate, but not within a party. Farage suggested he could do just as much to shift public opinion through media and social media as he could as a party leader.
In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph, Farage said his two main focuses would be China’s influence in the UK and ‘the woke agenda, literally the indoctrination of our children from primary school all the way through university with now a completely different interpretation of history’.
It is clear why Farage is so concerned about China. The UK government’s most recent foreign and defence policy review – ‘Global Britain in a Competitive Age: the Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy’, published on 16 March 2021 – mentions China 29 times, Russia just 14 times, North Korea eight times and Iran four.
The review recommends that the UK maintain a positive trading and economic relationship with China while recognising Beijing represents the biggest state-based threat to the UK. In March 2021, the Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab, said China was here to stay and pointed out no other country was taking the kind of harsh economic measures against China that hawks were advocating. ‘It would not be feasible to go into some old, outdated, cold war with China’, he said. Raab added China was sensitive about its reputation but admitted there was no firm evidence yet that it had been influenced by criticism from abroad, save at the margins. He insisted the UK was not seeking a free trade agreement with China any time soon but that it was essential for the UK to cooperate with China on climate change, described in the review as the UK’s number one international priority.
The balance in the approach to China, reflecting the Sinophile views of the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, attracted Tory backbench criticism, with a cross-party alliance on China claiming the strategy is ‘full of contradictions, dual standards and inconsistencies’. The parliamentarians claim the review’s call for closer trade and economic links directly contradicts the report’s claim that China represents the biggest state-based threat to UK security.
Sir Alex Younger, the former head of MI6, agrees. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘There’s no doubt that China represents the generational threat and the reason for that is that the idea that China will become more like us as it gets richer or as its economy matured is clearly for the birds’. ‘That’s not going to happen. On the contrary I expect China’s Communist party to double down on its ideology in the future.’ ‘There’s going to be an ideological divergence between us in the future, that’s going to generate rivalry and reduce trust.’
Younger’s concerns are shared by General Sir Patrick Sanders, Commander of UK Strategic Command, speaking at Chatham House in December 2020, who described China as a ‘chronic’ threat. He said: ‘China is the greatest strategic threat facing this country’. Sanders added: ‘We would like to have a constructive relationship with China, but some of their actions make us wary’. ‘While we were engaged in nation-building and counterinsurgency in the Middle East, the Chinese got ahead of us with technology.’ ‘They have exploited things like 5G, military capabilities in space, hypersonics and autonomy. It represents a paradigm shift in their approach to warfare’.
Also speaking at Chatham House, Jeremy Fleming, director of GCHQ, said cyber attacks on the UK had hit an all-time high since the coronavirus outbreak. Hospitals and vaccine suppliers targeted by China and other foreign powers who have tried to exploit the pandemic.
The Chinese navy also poses a growing threat to Britain’s global interests. In October 2020, Admiral Tony Radakin, the First Sea Lord, warned that an ‘increasingly assertive’ China could reach waters north of the UK by using the emerging Northern Sea Route. ‘Climate change is a concern for all of us, but it is opening up new maritime trade routes across the top of the world, halving the transit time between Europe and Asia. And we sit at the gateway to those routes’, the navy chief said. The navy says that the once icebound Northern Sea Route, which runs the length of Russia, has become passable to regular shipping during August, September and October without using an icebreaker. Experts say it is at least 10-12 sailing days quicker than traditional routes via Singapore and the Suez canal, and its emergence has become a growing source of concern at senior levels of the navy. They fear China will work with the Kremlin to try to exploit it for trade and military purposes. Chris Parry, a former rear admiral, said: ‘The Northern Sea Route is a major component of China’s Belt and Road initiative in its quest to dominate trade in and around Eurasia. The risk is that China, in cooperation with Russia, will seek to exclude others from the route by restrictive practices’.
The Royal Navy is increasingly being drawn into maritime conflict with China. In 2018 the then Defence Secretary, Gavin Williamson, sent HMS Albion to sail close to manmade islands in the South China Sea claimed by Beijing, although they are more than 200 miles away from its mainland. China said the UK had undertaken ‘provocative actions’ and aggressively asked the ship to move on. Navy insiders argue that Britain has to face up to a long-term challenge from Beijing, which is gradually becoming a military and economic superpower – tying in with a growing belief in Washington that China and the US are increasingly locked into a low-level conflict.
According to an annual review conducted by the Pentagon, China now boasts the world’s most powerful navy, with 350 ships and submarines. The Royal Navy ranks 28th by the number of vessels, although it is one of only three navies to have a pair of aircraft carriers or more, along with China and the US.
China is our enemy. We are engaged in a cold war with China. Why do we continue to trade with China?
The following example would be comical, if it were not so troubling. Can you guess where the NHS COVID-19 Self-Test (Rapid Antigen Test) is made? You guessed it, China. It was manufactured under contract to the Department of Health and Social Care by Xiamen Biotechnology Co Ltd, Fujian, China. China gave us COVID-19 and is now making money out of helping us fight COVID-19.
Boris thinks that we cannot afford to stop trading with China and Raab dutifully toes the party line. I disagree wholeheartedly. I think that we cannot afford not to boycott Chinese goods. We must resist the obvious temptation to buy cheap plastic crap from China. As it means that we are giving money to our biggest enemy.
I agree with everything that has been said on this subject and actually try very hard to avoid chinese and european goods wherever possible. I believe it makes a difference as I am not alone.
I agree with Classical Liberal and Nigel Farage on this. Personally I do regard China as ‘enemy number one’. It is very much like the U.S.S.R. was during the cold war. Except now it is worse because we certainly can not trust the U.N.
Even if one does not believe that the Covid19 pandemic was deliberately started to trash Western economies, it surely demonstrates that there are potentially worse weapons available in the modern world, than nuclear bombs.
Also there is the Global Warming Scam. Now with a name change to ‘Climate Change’. For heaven’s sake how can Western Nations scramble to reduce Carbon Dioxide emissions by not using fossil fuels while China openly burns more and more in a dirty manner.
Thinking our armed forces can run on electric power really takes the biscuit.
Increase trade with China?? NO NO definitely NOT. Almost anyone else but.
I wish it was possible to prevent any imports from China but that is not practical and would cause open hostility. We have to find other ways to make ourselves completely independent of Chinese products of any sort.
For goodness sake Boris stop paying attention to the keeper of your zip and wriggle out of the stupid carbon neutral trap!
I think we ought to be more careful about the language we use about other powerful states like China and Russia. At this point in time they are not our current ENEMY. Competitors in world trade and influence, yes. They could be potential future military threats too. It is right that Britain should position itself against the negative effects in our ambivalent trading relationships and against possible future bullying, however, let’s be honest, we haven’t the resources or personnel to be a significant military counter threat. I agree with Jack’s and Frederica’s comments on us having too many low quality Chinese imports, but whose fault is that? We can blame Thatcher for running down British industry, but is it not the British traders fault for making maximum profit from cheap imported goods, and the British public for not being discerning on quality? What’s wrong with us British, once the workshop of the world, not being able to produce quality items at a price people can afford. Let’s make the Brexit opportunity work, and get more productive to make Britain great again. “It’s not Great Bitain; it’s Great Products and Services!”
Indeed we do need to produce more of our own goods at reasonable prices but we also need to stop imports that clearly do not meet necessary standards.
Maybe Jack Thomas. Stop them because they are below our minimum standards.
Sorry Cap’n I’m not with you on this one
To me, what has been wrong with our dealings with the EU has been our failure, as Trump said, ” to go in hard enough” and to identify them as the ENEMY
Pussyfooting is not an option
If we believe Russia is a military threat to the Ukraine, if they are engaged. In cyber warfare, then they are the enemy and NATO is in existence to face them, whether we as a unit of that body are under militarised is relevant, but that should not affect the mien of the whole body which must stand united.
As with China, if we believe they are expansionist with imprudent designs on our economy and security and they are already intruding on countries friendly to us, as they attempted in Victoria Australia and other African countries, that they are persecuting their indigenous Muslim population, tha they annexed Tibet illegally, with force and rule that country as a tyrant
Then it that case they are the ENEMY
That we may have to trade and exist with the enemy as we did in the Cold War with the USSR, so be it, but it is well worthwhile each of the protagonists being well aware of the rules that govern that relationship
Good points Roger. Let’s not forget too the globalists who will be pandered to at their meeting in the West Country.
“… climate change, described in the review as the UK’s number one international priority.”
…and the ruination of our country if it is allowed to continue.
Ruination of our country, precisely Jack. Those words ‘the UK’s number one international priority’, who ever said that should be hung drawn and quartered.
The less we have to do with China the better. They are on a mission to rule the World.
Far better to work with India; indeed with the whole of the Commonwealth.
Allan you and I have been down this road before, I believe even in the days when this was UKIP Daily. And even on here there has been signal lack of enthusiasm.
At best there seems to be a cacophony of doubt that the Commonwealth would be interested in working with us fostered perhaps with the endemic EU wouldn’t like it, plus the remain foundation in general , Clegg who Farage identified as the leader of “the we are not good enough ” brigade and now plus the woke and BLM terrorists who seek through infamy and our gulability to make us believe that through our alleged past misdeeds we are not suitable to be seen in their company .
Perhaps overall that in the eyes of the EU and others we should not be perceived in making a success of Brexit, when I say ‘others’ I am sure that there are those who push global government, who do not wish a fully sovereign independent nation well
They cannot understand or accept that ” Brittania” no longer wishes to rule the waves but does demand the right to walk out of step with those who would impose illegal chains.
We are a nation who bends the knee to no one!
I’m sure there’s a nudge unit somewhere in the background ensuring the Commonwealth does not get a look in, perhaps it’s actually buried in the foreign office?
Yes Alan Wheatley. Agreed.
I would like to think that Nigel Farage will make a return to front line politics in the not too distant future perhaps with a new ‘new’ party that is run along democratic lines as UKIP was/is, and one that does not include Richard Tice who is very uninspiring. The Reform UK local election campaign and results were a disaster without Farage at the helm.
more like Mafia tie in
Don’t think the public buying cheap on-line Chinese crap is at the heart of this problem. It does make me wonder though how it is possible that the cost of on-line postage of an item from Canton is cheaper than postage for an equivalent item from Clapham!
What worries me though is how Western governments have allowed Chinese tech companies to engage in public sector contracting in sensitive industries compromising national security.
Indeed Jake; surely it cannot all be explained by incompetence, intent comes to mind.
Nigel Farage is on the ball about China as he is in his latest video here, where he visits the US/Mexico border, this is frightening stuff. Nigel describes this as an attempt to cancel America and we’re in the same boat here in the UK. China controls the United Nations and so the globalist, woke agenda: we are being attacked.
Have a look at Nigel’s video below, frightening stuff.
“Nigel Farage Investigates: Crisis at the US border.”
https://youtu.be/D27tO98_Tmo
Then think what is happening in the, not so English these days, Channel and uncontrolled mass immigration.
” we cannot afford not to boycott Chinese goods”
Indeed we cannot but shops and internet stores are stuffed with Chinese products. It is even difficult to find a reasonably priced pair of shoes without buying Chinese which, of course, last for months rather than years. However there are far more serious issues with such as Chinese steel which are not being addressed. I used to be able to avoid it by buying reusable steel sections from various suppliers / scrapyards. More recently it all seems to be cut up and exported to wherever (guess where).
The Chinese section can often be visually identified by failure to comply with the required profile but also by obvious hard spots when drilling or machining it. One machinist I knew told of the unacceptable scrappage of machined components due to that reason; the financial directors response was that it still saved money!
We need a concerted drive to remove our reliance on Chinese goods; they might be cheap initially but often fail to perform or last. Maybe they will improve with time but do we really want to rely on China for most of our purchases?
You’re right Jack. It is difficult not to buy Chinese goods these days. Try looking for a British-Made mark on many of the day-to-day things that most people buy. It isnt easy! When we lost our manufacturing base here (due to it being cheaper to make on foreign soil) we made ourselves ‘dependent’. Now we are so ‘dependent’ that we are sitting ducks for coercion-by-trade from ‘strong’ countries like China so that they end up holding us to ransom!
Hard to argue with any of that.
Its not trade when you pay billions for a power station and a agree to inflated electricity prices for years in advance. It was called collaboration in ww2.
Oh yes!!!!! Let’s call a spade a spade! Right on the nose Matt up North.