US Attorney General William Barr blasts ‘China’s playbook’ and Huawei’s dominance of 5G, suggests alliance with Nokia and Ericsson
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The US is locked in a technological and ideological battle with China that, if mishandled, threatens the nation’s economic prosperity, values and way of life, America’s top justice official said on Thursday.
“China has emerged as the United States’ top geopolitical adversary,” said US Attorney General William Barr in a speech at the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). “For China, success is a zero-sum game.”
Barr called on American universities, industry, society and its democratic allies to join together in countering the “blitzkrieg” threat posed by China’s authoritarian system before it is too late.
At one point he suggested that US companies should take controlling stakes in the international rivals of Chinese tech giants to counter their rise.
Past administrations and many in the private sector had “too often been willing to countenance China’s hardball tactics – and it has been this administration that has finally moved to confront and counteract China’s playbook”, said Barr, prompting enthusiastic applause from a handful of attendees in the packed hall.
