China will present “the greatest challenge” to the UK’s overseas interests and economic security in 2030, a defence intelligence chief said.
Adrian Bird, the chief of defence intelligence, said Russia will remain “the greatest threat to the UK mainland out to 2030,” but China will “compete more directly with the UK” across its areas of interest in the age of artificial intelligence and quantum computing.
Speaking to members of the Royal United Services Institute, Bird warned that Beijing can disrupt the UK’s “supplies of key technologies and materials” such as semiconductors and rare earth elements (REE).
The regime’s military, intelligence, space, and cyber capabilities are also posing increasing threats, the intelligence chief said.
REEs and semiconductors are essential for a wide range of things from smartphones, computers, and electric cars, to medical equipment, power stations, and weapon systems.
Most advanced semiconductors are produced in Taiwan and Korea, and China had been extracting around 80 percent of global REE supplies until a few years ago.
The COVID-19 pandemic, which originated in China, has caused a global shortage of semiconductors that impacted many downstream industries including the automotive sector. Geopolitical tensions—particularly anxieties over a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan and Beijing’s ambition for technological dominance—are also prompting countries to mitigate supply chain and national security risks.
Luke de Pulford, of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, told the PA news agency that it’s “blindingly obvious to anyone paying attention” that Bird’s comments are correct.
“Regrettably the only people who still don’t seem to get it are those in charge of UK foreign policy,” he said.
“We need an urgent plan to audit and reduce dependency on Beijing, and a healthy dose of realism to cleave officials from the naivety of the golden era.”
The government called the approach “robust pragmatism,” but critics, including dePaulford, have argued it’s “wishful thinking” to expect a communist regime to cooperate on global issues.
De Pulford said Chinese leader Xi Jinping has “never kept a climate promise, and uses the climate issue as a diplomatic bargaining chip against naive governments.”
Elsewhere in his speech, Bird warned that the pace of technological change will allow the UK’s adversaries and competitors to achieve a “rapid evolution in their capability to challenge the UK and our interests,” adding: “We must keep pace.”
He noted the UK should “not assume we will have an overriding technological advantage in future conflicts.”
He also forecasted competition among allies after material and human resources over the next few years.
States will likely be “forced more into strategic competition as shared values become less important than meeting a basic yet broad set of national security requirements for their populations, thus making relationships increasingly transactional,” he warned.
“This will include states prioritising increased resilience and self-sufficiency in the supply of energy and food and raw materials; as well as a renewed focus on human, environmental and health security within and beyond their borders.”
Bird said the instability could trigger more migration, “fuelling humanitarian and public health crises,” and increase the risks of confrontation.
