KCPAC 2020 ROK-USA Conference
4.15 General Election Analysis
Grand Hyatt Hotel, Seoul, South Korea
When we met in Seoul at KCPAC, Korean and American Conservatives, were focused on need to reassert our mutual commitment to each other and to freedom and democracy. Today we gather half a world apart, in the shadow of a global pandemic, crippled by societal lockdowns, in the grip of worldwide recession, and facing an openly aggressive China. Our concerns of a year ago seem mild by comparison.
That’s why KCPAC this year takes on even more importance. Some people urged us to cancel this year’s conference – it would be just too difficult they said….too many uncertainties….the American presidential election. The pandemic. Travel bans.
You know the great thing about conservatives? Just when things seem impossible, someone steps forward. That’s why we all owe a special debt of gratitude to Annie Chan, who made KCPAC2020 possible.
The other great thing about conservatives is We never give up! We figure thing out for ourselves, we adapt, we adjust, we keep going. We play the long game.
That is why I am so proud of the New Institute, One Korea Network, and especially our close friends and freedom fighters at KCPAC. And why I am especially honored to be part of the global movement that American Conservative Union Chairman Matt Schlapp and President Dan Schneider have created, linking conservatives all across America, and now all across the world.
Today we are engaged in very real struggle against authoritarian governments, communism, and those who would interfere with our right to free elections, expand their territorial ambitions, and deny our peoples the right to chart our own destinies. What happens in Asia in the next few years will determine global politics for a generation.
A year ago, President Trump was cautiously optimistic the US could reset our relationship with China by ending unequal tariffs and trade practices, outlawing intellectual property theft and maintaining the rule of law in the South and East China Seas. We were negotiating a phase one US-China trade deal, that promised to end the trade wars and create reciprocity.
The pandemic changed everything.
China’s behavior immediately before, during and after Covid-19 has forced American leaders of both parties, but especially President Trump, to reassess our relationship and chart a very different course going forward.
No matter how the coronavirus came about – in a laboratory in Wuhan, or from nature – the Chinese have used it as a biological weapon. Chinese scientists and doctors understood its potential for devastation almost immediately, and China’s leaders shut off domestic travel to and from Wuhan.
But instead of warning the world and urging steps to prevent a global pandemic, the Chinese government silenced their scientists, and covered up their findings. They downplayed the severity of the virus and encouraged travel to and from their infected country throughout the world. They knowingly spread contagion throughout Asia, Europe and North America. They prevented the World Health Organization from raising the alarm and even used it to propagate false narratives, lulling the world into inaction.
The Chinese government used those crucial few weeks to corner the international market on testing devices, medicines and personal protective equipment. Then, when the virus spread globally, they blackmailed countries which dared criticize China’s behavior by denying them access to these lifesaving medical supplies. They even threatened to withhold pharmaceuticals and antibiotics from the US markets.
Now that the world is in the throes of the pandemic and economic dislocation, which it caused, the Chinese are buying up technology companies and natural resources at fire-sale prices.
The Chinese navy is moving aggressively into the South and East China Seas and Taiwan Strait, claiming international waters as their own, building and then militarizing islands.
Just a few years ago Beijing promised Hong Kong could have its own legal system; a few weeks ago they reneged on that promise. If Hong Kong’s peopledare speak out against the Beijing government, or peacefully demonstrate they will be thrown in jail for life.
They proudly engage in wolf warrior diplomacy – any country or leader who dares to criticize China for anything is punished severely. Beijing is using its tariffs system to punish Australian beef and barley exports because the Australian government dared join a hundred other countries asking for an independent inquiry into the origins of Covid-19.
China never made a secret of its ambition to dominate the world by mid-century. They are building a modern Silk Road trade route linking Europe, Central and South Asia with their Belt Road Initiative. They are building a maritime trade route to bring goods from the Middle East and Africa through the South and East China Seas. Their Made in China 2025 plan aims to make China the dominant manufacturer of ten technologies of the future, including Artificial Intelligence, robotics, semi-conductors, and bioengineering and control. What they can’t acquire, buy or develop they steal. Finally, China intends to build the communications and internet infrastructure of the fourth industrial revolution, when the world moves to the internet of things.
There is nothing benign about Chinas behavior, and in recent months it has become all too clear that China intends, with predatory practices, to make the 21st century the Chinese century. The global political paralysis and economic destruction caused by Covid-19 has accelerated and condensed their timeline.
China plans to emerge from this period several years from now as the world’s most powerful economic, diplomatic, technological, military power and then rewrite the international rules of order with “Chinese characteristics”. Chinese leaders claim they do not want to conquer other countries. Perhaps that is true. But they do intend to control them.
American leaders – of both our political parties – once believed that if we underwrote Chinese economic development and helped it modernize, even at our own expense, China would become a more open society and economy, and a strong trading partner. We hoped China would follow the example of Japan, Korea, and Taiwan.
But we were wrong. As China modernized, its government has become more authoritarian, with a more closed economy and society. No one begrudges China for its ambitions to be a leading world power. But we cannot stand idly by and watch them exploit and abuse the rest of the world to achieve their ambitions.
In a series of landmark speeches, senior Trump Administration officials and cabinet members laid out the case against China – economic exploitation, intellectual property theft, massive personal data theft, wolf warrior diplomacy, diplomatic and military expansion, and disregard for the rule of law.
These officials have also laid out President Trump’s new policies toward China.
The US will no longer give Hong Kong special trade and legal status, it will be considered a part of China. The US government investment funds will no longer invest tens of billions of dollars in Chinese companies. Chinese companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange will no longer be exempt from transparency requirements placed on American and other companies.
We will bring the supply chains of critical products home to our own shores or those of our allies.
We will work to create a trade coalition of free market democracies in Europe and Asia, which will include Korea, and stand up to China together.
Finally, we will invest heavily in technological innovation, research and development, either directly through the government, in public-private partnerships, or indirectly by incentivizing the private sector.
The Chinese Communist Party has taken advantage of us all, exploited our generosity. Their recent aggressiveness, especially since the pandemic, has exposed their intentions. It has been a wakeup call for all of us, especially for free market democracies, and most especially for our allies in Asia. Recent events, especially the pandemic, have given the Chinese leaders a sense of entitlement and over-confidence that they are unstoppable. But they are not.
Authoritarian governments, are so accustomed to dictating to their own people that they believe they can treat other nations the same way. But eventually they push too far, to the point where those countries say “enough”.
Democracies, on the other hand, are often slow to recognize and act on growing threats to their peace and prosperity. But once our eyes are opened, we are capable of strong and decisive action. That is where America is today.
Some say we are entering a new cold war between the democratic and communist world, this time with China at the forefront. The United States does not seek war – either a cold war or a hot war. Nor do we seek to decouple from China. But we do seek a world where all nations respect the rule of law, and deal with each other fairly, and on the basis of reciprocity. We believe in free markets and free peoples, and we will work with others to guarantee our peace, prosperity and freedom.
