Amid a recent flurry of U.S.-China diplomacy, a leading congressional voice on China policy is warning against concessions to Beijing, saying they simply serve to encourage even more aggressive behavior. Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), recently spoke with VOA’s Mandarin Service to discuss the topics he believes should be raised in the meetings this week between Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and the Biden administration.
Gallagher believes that the most important topic to be discussed is cross-strait deterrence. He noted that Chinese President Xi Jinping has repeatedly said that he is willing to take Taiwan by force if necessary, and that the U.S. must send a strong message that this aggression will not be tolerated. He also urged the administration to urge the CCP to take more aggressive action when it comes to cracking down on the production of fentanyl precursors, as fentanyl is flooding across the southern U.S. border and killing tens of thousands of Americans. Finally, Gallagher stressed the importance of not deprioritizing the issue of human rights, such as the ongoing genocide in Xinjiang, economic coercion, and the suppression of Hong Kongers.
When asked if the high-level official communications between the U.S. and China signal a smoother and more pragmatic path for U.S.-China relations, Gallagher expressed his concern that the policy of engagement could have the opposite effect. He warned that the more the U.S. rushes or bends over backwards to sit down at a table with the CCP, the more aggressive the CCP becomes, and that the U.S. is delaying critical defensive action, such as ending the licensing exemptions for Chinese companies like Huawei.
Gallagher also noted that the current conflicts in Israel and Ukraine should be a wake-up call to the West, as they demonstrate the threat posed by an axis of authoritarian powers arrayed against U.S. and allied interests. He believes that this should be an opportunity for the U.S. to revitalize and rebuild its defense industrial base, and to learn the lessons of the failure of deterrence in Ukraine and ensure that those failures are not repeated in the Indo-Pacific region. He stressed that hard power gives the U.S. its best chance of deterring totalitarian aggression, and that if the U.S. does not surge hard power to the Pacific now, before it’s too late, there could be a PLA invasion of Taiwan, which could make the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Israel look timid in comparison.
In conclusion, Rep. Mike Gallagher’s warnings about the dangers of concessions to the CCP should be taken seriously. The U.S. must take a strong stance against Chinese aggression and ensure that its defensive actions are not delayed in the hopes of appeasing the CCP. The current conflicts in Israel and Ukraine should serve as a reminder of the threat posed by authoritarian powers, and the U.S. must take steps to protect its interests in the Indo-Pacific region.
