A Major issue from a British perspective, I think it will apply equally to the EU OZ, Canada and US. The threat is varied but real...... the answer is in the hands of our leaders so we are in real trouble. So how do we respond? INCREASED PREPPING and more steps to self sufficiency.
https://unherd.com/2021/01/how-china-could-turn-off-britains-lights/
In any future war between Britain and China, the winner could be decided in a matter of hours — and Britain is unlikely to be the victor. For years now, Chinese businesses have been quietly positioned at the heart of British infrastructure. Were a conflict to erupt, their employees could, willingly or otherwise, be mobilised by Beijing. In fact, they would be legally compelled to.
What could this mean in practice? To put it simply, if he were so inclined, President Xi Jinping could, at the flick of a button, turn off the lights at 10 Downing Street — not to mention freeze Britain’s financial system and paralyse its hospitals.
Perhaps that’s why there has been such a concerted effort by British politicians in recent weeks to address their country’s dependence on trade with Beijing. These efforts are certainly well-intentioned, but as someone who has spent years charting China’s silent campaign of global interference and subversion, I fear they could be too late. In my recent book, Hidden Hand, my co-author Mareike Ohlberg and I detailed the threat the Chinese Communist Party poses to Western democracy. Here, for the first time, a small but disproportionately concerning new aspect of that can be revealed: how China is slowly taking over Britain’s nuclear power and electricity systems.
On the face of it, you could be forgiven for wondering why Chinese investment is so troubling. Why should we care that its businesses are investing in Britain, when those from other countries — including a number of unpleasant ones — do the same? The answer is straightforward. China is different because its businesses can be, and are, used as an extension of the ruling Chinese Communist Party. Referred to as a “party-corporate conglomerate”, there is a deep intermingling of China’s business elite with the “red aristocracy” — that is, the Communist Party families that rule the nation. Even President Xi, who pledged to crack down on corruption following the CCP’s 18th National Congress in 2012, has family members with secret offshore bank accounts and hundreds of millions in assets squirrelled away.
At its heart, however, the party-corporate conglomerate is built on the strength of China’s powerful state-owned enterprises. While we in the West once believed that, under the auspices of “globalisation”, drawing China into the global economy would see independent private enterprise prevail, under Xi the opposite has occurred. In 2016, for example, President Xi declared that the party’s leadership is the “root and soul” of state-owned companies and they should “become important forces to implement” the decisions of the party.
More worryingly, the following year China’s parliament passed a law that obliges all Chinese citizens overseas to provide assistance to the country’s intelligence services if requested: Article Seven stipulates that “any organisation or citizen shall support, assist, and cooperate with state intelligence work according to law.” And that applies to heads of Chinese corporations as much as to any other citizen. If China’s shadowy Ministry of State Security tells the boss of Huawei in Britain to do some spying, then he is obliged to obey. Anyone who dared to refuse could be escorted back to China quick-smart — never to be seen again.
Such occurrences are, however, rare. Chinese companies have Communist Party cells active inside them — the secretary of the cell is the most powerful person in the company. After all, he (and it normally it is a he) represents the masters in Beijing and can over-rule the company’s board. However, conflict between a company board and party cell is hardly common. In 2016, President Xi decreed that the positions of party secretary and chairman of a Chinese company’s board should be occupied by the same person.
All of this applies to the state-owned China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN), which owns a third of the nuclear power station being built at Hinkley Point and hopes to be involved in the construction of two more nuclear plants, at Sizewell in Suffolk and Bradwell in Essex. The personnel of CGN is typical of any CCP-sponsored company. Until a few months ago, its chairman in Shenzhen, was a man called He Yu, who doubled as the secretary of the company’s Communist Party cell. He was instrumental in securing CGN’s investment in the Hinkley power plant.
His replacement, Yang Changli, was appointed secretary of the party committee and chairman of the CGN’s board in July 2020. As business executives, their aim is to advance CGN’s commercial interests, but as senior cadres of the CCP their first loyalty must be to the party.
Nor are He and Yang the only ones at CGN with disturbing ties to the CCP. Outside of China, Zheng Dongshan, the man who runs its UK subsidiary, has also been a member of the parent company’s “CCP Leadership Group”. However, before he arrived in Britain in 2017, “Comrade Zheng” took the precaution of resigning from his party positions. Even so, it’s safe to say that he still toes the party line. If Beijing asks CGN UK to do something, then it must — even if it could spell disaster for the UK.
https://unherd.com/2021/01/how-china-could-turn-off-britains-lights/
In any future war between Britain and China, the winner could be decided in a matter of hours — and Britain is unlikely to be the victor. For years now, Chinese businesses have been quietly positioned at the heart of British infrastructure. Were a conflict to erupt, their employees could, willingly or otherwise, be mobilised by Beijing. In fact, they would be legally compelled to.
What could this mean in practice? To put it simply, if he were so inclined, President Xi Jinping could, at the flick of a button, turn off the lights at 10 Downing Street — not to mention freeze Britain’s financial system and paralyse its hospitals.
Perhaps that’s why there has been such a concerted effort by British politicians in recent weeks to address their country’s dependence on trade with Beijing. These efforts are certainly well-intentioned, but as someone who has spent years charting China’s silent campaign of global interference and subversion, I fear they could be too late. In my recent book, Hidden Hand, my co-author Mareike Ohlberg and I detailed the threat the Chinese Communist Party poses to Western democracy. Here, for the first time, a small but disproportionately concerning new aspect of that can be revealed: how China is slowly taking over Britain’s nuclear power and electricity systems.
On the face of it, you could be forgiven for wondering why Chinese investment is so troubling. Why should we care that its businesses are investing in Britain, when those from other countries — including a number of unpleasant ones — do the same? The answer is straightforward. China is different because its businesses can be, and are, used as an extension of the ruling Chinese Communist Party. Referred to as a “party-corporate conglomerate”, there is a deep intermingling of China’s business elite with the “red aristocracy” — that is, the Communist Party families that rule the nation. Even President Xi, who pledged to crack down on corruption following the CCP’s 18th National Congress in 2012, has family members with secret offshore bank accounts and hundreds of millions in assets squirrelled away.
At its heart, however, the party-corporate conglomerate is built on the strength of China’s powerful state-owned enterprises. While we in the West once believed that, under the auspices of “globalisation”, drawing China into the global economy would see independent private enterprise prevail, under Xi the opposite has occurred. In 2016, for example, President Xi declared that the party’s leadership is the “root and soul” of state-owned companies and they should “become important forces to implement” the decisions of the party.
More worryingly, the following year China’s parliament passed a law that obliges all Chinese citizens overseas to provide assistance to the country’s intelligence services if requested: Article Seven stipulates that “any organisation or citizen shall support, assist, and cooperate with state intelligence work according to law.” And that applies to heads of Chinese corporations as much as to any other citizen. If China’s shadowy Ministry of State Security tells the boss of Huawei in Britain to do some spying, then he is obliged to obey. Anyone who dared to refuse could be escorted back to China quick-smart — never to be seen again.
Such occurrences are, however, rare. Chinese companies have Communist Party cells active inside them — the secretary of the cell is the most powerful person in the company. After all, he (and it normally it is a he) represents the masters in Beijing and can over-rule the company’s board. However, conflict between a company board and party cell is hardly common. In 2016, President Xi decreed that the positions of party secretary and chairman of a Chinese company’s board should be occupied by the same person.
All of this applies to the state-owned China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN), which owns a third of the nuclear power station being built at Hinkley Point and hopes to be involved in the construction of two more nuclear plants, at Sizewell in Suffolk and Bradwell in Essex. The personnel of CGN is typical of any CCP-sponsored company. Until a few months ago, its chairman in Shenzhen, was a man called He Yu, who doubled as the secretary of the company’s Communist Party cell. He was instrumental in securing CGN’s investment in the Hinkley power plant.
His replacement, Yang Changli, was appointed secretary of the party committee and chairman of the CGN’s board in July 2020. As business executives, their aim is to advance CGN’s commercial interests, but as senior cadres of the CCP their first loyalty must be to the party.
Nor are He and Yang the only ones at CGN with disturbing ties to the CCP. Outside of China, Zheng Dongshan, the man who runs its UK subsidiary, has also been a member of the parent company’s “CCP Leadership Group”. However, before he arrived in Britain in 2017, “Comrade Zheng” took the precaution of resigning from his party positions. Even so, it’s safe to say that he still toes the party line. If Beijing asks CGN UK to do something, then it must — even if it could spell disaster for the UK.
