The Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, who is the number one intelligence official in the United States, has labelled China as the “biggest threat to democracy and freedom worldwide since World War Two”.
According to Ratcliffe, China is bent on global domination and in an essay written by him he said that Chinese authorities had “conducted human testing” on members of the Chinese army “in hopes of developing soldiers with biologically enhanced capabilities.”
In an opinion article on the Wall Street Journal website, Ratcliffe writes, “The intelligence is clear: Beijing intends to dominate the US and the rest of the planet economically, militarily and technologically,”.
This information comes after a CNN news report that exposed China’s mishandling of the early stages of Covid-19 and how it deliberately failed to inform of the severity of the virus to the global community.
Ratcliffe’s Wall Street Journal essay is in sync with President Donald Trump tough-on-China legacy which many believe Biden might slowly strip away. However, before Trump leaves office he could limit the incoming Biden administration’s room for manoeuvre in dealing with Beijing.
He said, “China poses the greatest threat to America today, and the greatest threat to democracy and freedom worldwide since World War Two.”
As the director of National Intelligence, Ratcliffe had shifted resources within the $85 billion annual federal budget allocated to intelligence to increase the focus on China.
According to Ratcliffe, China’s economic espionage approach was threefold: “Rob, Replicate and Replace.” Chins as per the contents of the essay want to steal American companies’ intellectual property, copy it and then supplant US companies in the global market place.
China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying called these US accusations of technology theft were “ludicrous.”
On Wednesday ( December 2), the U.S. House of Representatives passed a law “The Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act” to kick any Chinese companies off US stock exchanges if they do not fully comply with the country’s auditing rules.
China in its response to the letter, called it a ‘concoction of lies’. The Chinese Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Hua Chunying said that the article was just a ‘sensational headline’ which did not show any real evidence. “He just continued and repeated what is I think another concoction of lies”, she said at a press briefing.
The spokesperson had told Reuters that Ratcliff’s comments were ‘fact-distorting’ showing cold war mindset of and ideological prejudices of some people on the US side.
“We hope American politicians will respect the facts, stop making and selling fake news, stop fabricating and spreading political viruses and lies and stop damaging Sino-US relations, otherwise it will only further damage the credibility of the United States”, Hua Chunying said in the briefing.