Category Archives: defense policy

Economic Extortion

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The Wuhan Virus, which originated from the city of that name, in the province of Hubei, in the heartland of the People’s Republic of China, may not have been released on the world deliberately, but the situation is certainly being taken advantage of by the PRC.

Congressman Mark Green (R, TN) has advised us all that French President Emmanuel Macron was talking to PRC President Xi Jinping and asked him for a billion masks.

Xi readily agreed—on condition that France implement its 5G wireless communications network with Huawei equipment.  No Huawei, no masks; French medical personnel, French patients can just die.

This comes against the backdrop our own health care companies having to recall surgical gowns made in the PRC because they might have been tainted—they were manufactured in facilities that hadn’t met standards for manufacture since 2018.  Netherlands has had to recall masks manufactured and delivered by the PRC because those masks were defective and provided none of the protections they were supposed to provide. Spain and Turkey also have had defective medical equipment foisted off on them by the PRC. Czech Republic is the recipient of PRC-made Wuhan Virus test kits with an 80% failure rate (Bing Translator is friendly enough).

Macron might want to pay more attention to what his neighbors in the EU are being cheated with, as well as who’s doing the cheating, along with studying the nature of extortion.

A New AUMF?

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Or, perhaps, an additional one. The editors at The Wall Street Journal have an idea.

The Administration could quietly push a narrow Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) that gives Mr Trump power to strike Iran-backed Shiite militias in Iraq as needed.

That’s too narrow; any new AUMF should authorize the President to strike Iran-backed militias—not just Shiite ones, and not just in Iraq.

More than that, though, the Pentagon…drawing up plans to eliminate Kataib Hezbollah and such an AUMF are not mutually exclusive. Both should be done.

Neither is it necessary for this targeted AUMF to replace the AUMF in place; whether that’s a good or bad idea is a separate question.

The editors also pointed out the opprobrium likely to flow from administration critics as a result of going after this or that terrorist organization, those objections centering on the fear that we would only provoke terrorists.

Administration critics would object to the administration turning up heat on terrorists wherever they are, though. The only reason these should be taken seriously is the political power they wield in Congress. That’s something We the People need to correct in November.

What Are They Going to Do?

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Cut us off?

The chairman of Huawei Technologies Co warned the US to expect countermeasures from the Chinese government if it further restricts the technology giant’s access to suppliers….
Eric Xu, Huawei’s chairman, said he believes Beijing would respond with restrictions of its own on American companies operating in China if the US.

In addition to the draconian restrictions already inflicted on American companies—and other nations’ companies—operating in the People’s Republic of China. These restrictions include demands for government-controlled backdoors into companies’ operating software and transfer of companies’ technologies to domestic partner companies—which are required for most foreign companies in order to operate in the PRC.

With the PRC’s threat to cut us off from needed medicines, intermediate medical chemicals, and medical equipment, and the PRC’s recent attempt to restrict access to rare earth elements, it’s become clear that our manufacturers—and Europe’s, come to that—need to revamp their supply chains to vastly reduce their dependence on PRC intermediaries and suppliers, if not eliminate that dependency altogether.

Xu’s threat only emphasizes that need.

Supply Chain Disruption at the Source

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Retailers are beginning to suspend, or cancel outright, orders from their Asian factories and other suppliers.  So far, it’s intended to be temporary; for example:

Ulrika Isaksson, an H&M spokeswoman, said “our long-term commitment to suppliers will remain intact, but in this extreme situation we need to respond fast.”

The suspensions and cancelations might—might—seem warranted regarding Asian suppliers, but the temporary nature of them, to the extent they’re warranted at all, should be limited to South and East Asia—in the main, Vietnam, Republic of Korea, and Japan.

The cancelations need to be made permanent regarding the People’s Republic of China, given that government’s dishonesty and its companies’ well-known poor quality control—the latest example of which is directly related to the PRC’s role in the Wuhan Virus’ global spread and that nation’s pretended claim to be aiding in the world’s recovery:

…Beijing sent 150,000 coronavirus rapid testing kits to [the Czech Republic] which return false results up to 80% of the time.

PRC producers just can’t be trusted; retailers, and all other producers, need to adjust their supply chains to originate somewhere else than in the People’s Republic of China. Permanently.

A Start

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But we need to go further.  Recall that an official of the Communist Party of China threatened to cut off US access to life-savings medicines that are manufactured in the People’s Republic of China [Bing Translate translation from the Xinhua publication].

If China retaliates against the United States at this time, in addition to announcing the travel ban on the United States, it also announced the strategic control of medical products and the ban on exports to the United States, then the United States will fall into the ocean of new crown [corona] viruses.

Senator Tom Cotton (R, AR) and Congressman Mike Gallagher (R, WI) have introduced legislation that will begin to address such dependencies and improve our national security.

The Chinese Communist Party threatened to cut off America’s access to vital drugs in the midst of a pandemic caused by its own failures. It’s time to pull America’s supply chains for life-saving medicine out of China and make the CCP pay for contributing to this global emergency.

The proposed legislation would

  • task an FDA registry with tracking drug ingredients
  • ban the Federal government from buying drugs with a supply chain that originates in the PRC
  • require drugs to be labeled with the name of the country where they came from
  • provide benefits to manufacturers who make their drugs or medical equipment in the US
  • take effect in 2022.

But it, or quickly following legislation, needs to go much farther.

  • Feds should buy no drugs with a supply chain that passes through the PRC, not merely originate there
  • manufacturer benefits should be limited to preferential government buys and support for drug development, not overt outlays of taxpayer money
  • push the pace: the requirements should take effect in 2021, or sooner, depending on how quickly manufacturers can readjust their supply chains

Further legislation should do the same regarding other items important to national security, items like medical equipment, computer chips of all types, energy-related equipment.