Next, a discussion on u. S. China relations with virginia senator washing a mark warner vice chair of the Intelligence Committee from the u. S. Institute of peace this is an hour and ten minutes. Good afternoon, everybody im Nancy Lindberg im the president petition u. S. Institute of peace. And delighted to welcome everybody here for a very timely conversation with senator mark warner from virginia. About the u. S. China relationship, an issue getting a lot of attention these days. Senator warner has been at the forefront of china. And has been a leader on the conversation related to Foreign Policy and National Security issues both on china and through his years of service in the senate. For those of you who are joining us for the first time, u. S. Ip was founded by congress as a nonpartisan national institute, dedicated to working with partners around the world to prevent and resolve violent conflict. And one of the things we do here in our headquarters in washington is to provide a space for conversation about the most crystal Foreign Policy issues of the day. And i think the u. S. China relationship certainly qualifies as that. And that is exactly what brings us together. We have seen over the past decade how china has shifted many of its policies. Becoming far more active in the international stanl and particularly its invested heavily in countries around the world and playing a much more active role regionally. We have seen it from north korea, to burma to africa. Here at usip our China Program directed by jennifer stats has looked at the role of mcin conflict affected countries. As part of that work u. S. Leads a series of bipartisan senior study groups, the first two of which have looked at north korea, nuclear and peace negotiations and chinas role in burmas internal conflicts. I invite you to check those out on our web which is where you can find them. It is my pleasure to introduce senator werner. He brings a very rich background, a very useful background that combines a Business Technology career with Public Service. And in addition to being the senator from the great state of virginia, he has also serve as virginia virginias governor. He has a proven record of bipartisanship working to advance u. S. Interests and security abroad. And most importantly he is the various chair of the senate Intelligence Committee where he has worked with senator richard burr and other senators on both sides of the aisle. This combination of the private sector, Technology World and Public Service world, i think gives him particularly keen insights into the topic that we are discussing today. And he ha has really been in the forefront of leading conversations about technology, economic and trade issues. All of which are at the core of the u. S. China relationship. Thank you everybody for joining us today. Thank you for those joining online. If you are using social media, please use the hashtag and join us for the conversation at hashtag sen werner at usip. With that please welcome o join me in welcoming senator warner. Thank you, nancy. Thank you for introduction. Thank you for the great work usip does on so many subjects. Its great to see so many people here. I do want to acknowledge my dear friend raymond mood who we were just talking, close to 40year friend and involved in the u. S. Institute of peace and a number of terribly critical jent ventures nationally and around the region. Toipt commend the institute for the important work you do on Foreign Policy challenges. Ive got a lot to say. So and i want to make sure we have plenty time for the discussion let me get right at it. Today i think there is a widespread understanding that confronts a rising mcis the Foreign Policy challenge of our time. China is a global competitor of 1. 4 billion people, living under an authoritarian system of government. That is vying for economic, political and military influences globally. It is governed by the Chinese Communist party whose view of individual liberty, rule of law and Democratic Values is starkly different from those of our own. On all these points there is broad bipartisan agreement. However, there is far less agreement on what our response is to these realities should look like. How do we enact a strategy that continues to protect u. S. Interests and International Institutions while staying true to our values . I believe we can retain our leadership and Global Competitive advantage by embracing these defining characteristics that have made america the leader of the free world. Those characteristics are our belief in the rule of law, our checks and balances against government overreach, and our respect for the rights of an individual, especially when the rights come into conflict with the government or a majority faction. These values are the foundation of our International Successes and of our strongest alliances. Today, china is offering a very different model to the world. It has achieved a meteoric rise while rejecting some of the core values. I want to make one thing clear at theout set. My beef with the policies of president xi jinping and the Chinese Communist party. Not with the chinese people. And especially not with americans of chinese decent. But the chuting truth is the Chinese Communist party is intent on fundamentally reshaping the norms and values that underwrite decades of global stability, security and prosperity. The question is, how do we respond . Do we engage mcin a head to head square cold war on multiple fronts . Or do we embrace what i would argue is our more traditional leadership role and strengthen the International Order that beijing is attempting to upend. I would argue the second approach of offering a better model to the world, rooted in freedom and opportunity is both consistent our values and the approach most likely to succeed. First, i want to talk briefly about how we got here. In many ways were having a conversation like this because the conventional wisdom has changed rapidly over the past few years. Until recently conventional wisdom told us that the u. S. And china would both rise together, two nations intertwined, partnership and trade, business and education. Ic many, i hoped that the prcs greater global integration would lead for a more open, prosperous and potentially more democratic china, and that a rising china would be good for the world. Today it is clear that the aims of president xi and the Chinese Communist party do not align with that vision. Instead, the Chinese Government has worked to challenge the rulesbased International System and expand its brand of global influence, military military presence and economic power. It is time to wick up to the fact that beijing is pursuing a strategy not only to strengthen china but to explicitly diminish u. S. Power and influence. To do this, the communist party is exploiting all the elements of state power, to strengthen chinas position in the world. And theyre doing this at the expense of human rights and human dignity. The way i see it, these efforts fall into four buckets. Military power, influence campaigns, economic expansion, and an area that has not received enough attention, science and technology policy. First on the military front, the Peoples Liberation army, the pla is expanding both its own domestic bases and starting to establish bases overseas. Chinas naval forces are now able to conduct operations further from home. In the indian ocean waters around europe and the western pacific. Under the doctrine of military civilian civil fusion beijing has pursued a cutting edge set of cutting Edge Technologies such as ai, unmanned systematics and hypersonics withes, the essential to 21st century war fighting. And the pla is moderning its military at the fraction of the cost that those of news the west approach. They are effectively skipping a generation of expensive r d. By adopting platforms from foreign militaries or sometimes stealing the intellectual property to do so. Contrast that with the United States where we continue to spend 750 billion on defense. Including expense of updates, the legacy military systems and platforms. To compound this, china is focusing efforts on tools of asymmetric warfare like cyber, space and misinformation and disinformation. U. S. Defense and intelligence officials are increasingly concerned that the pla now threatens the United StatesUnited States in specific domains such as cyber, and space. And that china even leads in specific military technologies again such as hypersonic weaponry. Former dni coates and others have warned of chinas ability to target Critical Infrastructure right here at home. Like our electric grid using Cyber Attacks. I worry as well about the pl as willingness to use cybertheft for economic espionage. The truth is china is demonstrating that wars with near peer competitors may no longer be a traditional mill to mill conflict but instead for the u. S. And our allies increasingly clear that cyberand again misnegatives, disinformation will be just as critical as military might Going Forward in the 21st century. The second aspect of chinas strategy deals with efforts to wage influence campaigns beyond its borders. The prc has tried to dictate how foreign entities characterize sensitive topics like the dalai lama or tiananmen square. Beige has forced globals powers to dictate the world. You dictating how u. S. Airlines put taiwan on global maps. On college campuses, we have seen china use student groups like the confucius institutes to shape and stifle debate. More broadly, the Chinese Communist party relies on a network of think tanks, newspapers and aligned businesses and political leaders to shape perceptions of china and the party. They have also used their economic investments awraud to leverage pressure to pressure other nations to support diplomatic agenda. Just recently this one was particularly noteworthy just recently a number of countries, including marmgt muslim countries signed a letter expressing support for chinas tactics with the uyghur population. And the Chinese Government has pursued an extensive social media disinformation campaign, exploiting the continued vulnerabilities of youtube, facebook, twitter, all sites banned in mainland china, to spread propaganda abroad. The party also dominates chinese Language Services like we chat. Expanding control over the flow of information, not only within its borders with you but within its Expat Community as well. The tactics are an extension of the doctrine of cyberthe sovereignty. The idea that the state has the absolute right to control information within its border. China has already brought in notion to bear on its people. In the form of censorship, domestic disinformation and the social Credit System. But increasingly we are seeing it exported on a global scale. Third, on the economic front, president xi has pursued two Economic Strategies aimed at displaysing the United States position of economic leadership. To the china 2025 plan xi has focused on developing domestic chinese capabilities in Strategic Industries of the future. At the same time, the prc is working to expand chinese exports globally to existing customers as well as the developing world. President xi is making a play for dominance in areas like 5g, ai, quantum computing. Robotics. And increasingly biotech. In addition china to employing the full power of the state to build the infrastructure and here is something ditch set the standards for new technologies like 5g wireless. Actually adopting tactics the United States used for much of the 20th century. But unlike the u. S. Mcis trying to set the standards to promote its own interests. Rather than the notions of any sort of fair competition. At the same time, china exploits the openness of the International Trading system to gain access for Chinese Governments. And beijing has maintained or even increased barriers to foreign competitions. Globally, the belt and Road Initiative to build infrastructure and trade relationships heavily weigh in chinas interests. Accompanying this has been a digital initiate toef promote Chinese Telecommunications equipment. The goal is not simply to promote chinese vendors but to seed the Global Telecom market with equipment and service that is could be exploited by Chinese Security services. The truth is Chinese Communist party is attempting to harness Chinese Companies, Civil Society and even overseas die spora as an stinks of the state thighs efforts are frankly neither hidden or frankly very despite protests to the career contrary pb, no chinese company, however global, is actually private. These companies dont make decisions entirely for economic or commercial reasons. Because they are legally required to act as an extension of the Chinese Communist party when called upon. And this leads to the fourth aspect of chinas efforts to reshape the International Order. Its science and technology policy. Again and again we have seen u. S. Companies forced into joint ventures with Chinese Companies. Or required to share specific code and other ip in order just to get access to the chinese market. We have heard from American Companies who have been put out of business after chinese competitors stole their technology and produced their own lower cost version of the american product with state subsidies. But chinas blatant effort to steal western technology did not stop at its border. The Justice Department revealed last year that more than 90 of dojs economic espionage cases and more than two thirds of currently open trade secrets cases all involve china. In particular, the Chinese Communist government views western universities and government labs as fertile grounds for transfer of Sensitive Research back to china. And whats particularly alarming is that it sees chinese expats, especially students and academics as essential assets in these efforts. The fact is chinese nationals now make up roughly one third of all foreign students studying in the u. S. Out of the 363,000 chinese nationals, studying in the u. S. Last year, nearly half of them were majoring in s. T. E. M. Fields. And many of them are returning home to take advantage of the opportunities in chinas growing economy. My concern isnt necessarily with people who want to come here and learn and then go home. But i do have a concern that the communist party is attempting to coerce some of these individuals for Technology Information and intelligence collection purposes. Let me be career. The majority of these students are blameless. And make significant contributions to the Research Environment and to the u. S. Economy. But we have to acknowledge that whats changed has been in the last few years more and more the Chinese Intelligence Services often preys upon this population. Literally threaten the students families at home saying your son or daughter needs to not only come home but bring a thumb drive back. The truth is president xi, china is drifting from the International Cooperation and shifting to a more nationalistic and confrontational path of scientific advancement. While we must not lose sight of founding principles we cant ignore the fact that mcis now playing by a different set of rules. So where does that leave us . Left unoppose ds this threat to global norms and values jeopardizes not just americas position in the world. It risks undermining the whole notion of free inquiry, free travel, Free Enterprise and other values that have animated decades of global stability and prosperity. Thats why im so keeply concerned by the trump administrations erratic and incoherent approach. While the administration has rightly raised concern about china, something frankly that previous president s should have done earlier, the administrations unilateral approach to the challenge is not leading us toward success. After all the difficulties i have outlined pose a challenge let me makes sure challenge not just to the United States, not just to the west but to all nations success. Democracy, individual liberty or independent judiciary and the rule of law, countries like japan, south korea, japan, australia, india and others all face the western and other