“HER MAJESTY the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Ireland, and His Majesty the Emperor of China, being desirous of putting an
end to the misunderstandings and consequent hostilities which have arisen
between the two countries, have resolved to conclude a Treaty for that purpose
. . .” The Treaty of Nanking, August 1842
Alphen, Netherlands. 19 October. Kowtow: Chinese custom of touching ground
with forehead as a sign of worship or absolute submission. (Oxford English
Dictionary). There will be senior Mandarins in Beijing smiling this morning at
the satisfying irony of what is in effect the nuclear equivalent of the 1842
Treaty of Nanking. On 29 August 1842, at
the end of the First Opium War, Britain imposed the Treaty of Nanking on the Chinese
Emperor under the then mighty guns of the Royal Navy. It was the first of the
so-called ‘unequal treaties’. This week Britain will touch the ground with its
forehead to seek Chinese money and technology at outrageously advantageous terms
to Beijing to fund three nuclear energy plants. It is nothing short of a
nuclear Nanking, and pay-back for China’s past humiliation at British hands. In
a desperate bid to close Britain’s looming energy gap is Britain about to make
a dangerous choice between America and China?
Naturally, no mention will be made of Nanking as President Xi
Jinping arrives today in Britain to begin a four day state visit which Beijing
is heralding as the start of a “golden era” in Anglo-Chinese relations. However,
even as President Xi sets foot on British soil America’s most modern fleet is
on course to enter the South and East China Seas in a ‘freedom of navigation’
exercise to challenge China’s occupation of 209 islands and what looks like the
construction of military bases on some of them.
Since the early 1970s Britain has had a foreign, security and
defence policy that is at best a contradiction; the former focused on the EU,
with the latter focused on the United States.
Amongst friends such a contradiction could for the most part be massaged
away by Whitehall’s many political masseurs. However, British Chancellor of the
Exchequer (finance minister) and true architect of government policy George
Osborne, wants to take the art of strategic massage into even more intimate
spaces by in effect giving much of Britain’s civil nuclear energy policy to
China.
In spite of warnings from Britain’s security services, and in
spite of a series of announcements that will be made this week about ‘guarantees’
to UK-Chinese cyber ‘relations’, the deal is replete with risk to Britain and
indeed its allies. Indeed, not long ago
I was told by a senior British military officer that Britain was under ‘daily
industrial cyber-attack’ from China. Now, China is Britain's new “best friend”.
Have I missed something?
The deal is as ever being driven by those masters of the
short-term HM Treasury, who never seem to miss an opportunity to make the wrong
strategic decision for all the wrong short-term reasons. Yes, a strong trading
relationship with China is of course desirable, but not at the expense of
Britain’s security and defence.
Whitehall likes to hide Britain’s supine and abject weakness
at such moments with a blast of hubris. By ‘engaging’ China in such a way
Britain is not selling its defence-strategic soul for energy, but rather
helping to make China a responsible world citizen. To demonstrate Britain’s
lofty ambitions, the official line goes, London will again raise China’s abuse
of human rights.
Let me tell you how Britain ‘raises human rights’ with China.
The last time David Cameron went to China there was a box marked ‘human rights’.
Yes, a box. The box was given to the Chinese Foreign Ministry by the British
Foreign and Commonwealth Office. During Cameron’s visit a junior British
official met with the most junior of Chinese officials to ‘discuss’ human
rights. By that ruse Cameron could say he had raised human rights with the
Chinese. It is of course complete and utter nonsense. Indeed, it would be far
better to simply admit the truth; trade with China is far more important to
Britain than China’s abuse of human rights. If such supine kowtowing to dodgy,
rich regimes is what future British life outside the EU will look like it
almost makes me want to stay in…almost.
In for a penny, in for a pound (or is that yuan)? If the
government is prepared to offer China the equivalent of a nuclear Nanking, why
not go the whole nuclear hog and ask Beijing to pay for Britain’s other big
nuclear project; the planned replacement of the Trident nuclear missile system
and the four nuclear submarines that would carry them. At the very least
Britain could ask the Chinese to lease Britain the nuclear submarines upon
which the US-built missiles would be carried? Surely, the US Navy would not mind
and in any case it would be good for trade.
My cynicism is well-founded. Those same smiling Mandarins
will be fully aware of the impact this deal will have on London’s taut and
fraught strategic relationship with Washington. It is a consequence that will
not have been lost on Beijing as it seeks to isolate America from its broke European
allies via the strategic application of sovereign wealth. Indeed, this nuclear
Nanking will only reinforce a perception gained in Washington when Britain
backed China’s Asian Investment Bank that London no longer thinks strategically.
And, that Britain can no longer be relied upon as an ally in dealing with an increasingly
aggressive and assertive strategic competitor.
In 1842 the Treaty of Nanking was the product of a Britain at
the height of its imperial power and reflected a foreign policy crafted by Lord
Palmerston that was predicated purely and simply on mercantilism – the enrichment
of Britain through ‘free trade’ on British terms. Today, Britain’s leaders are
still obsessed with mercantilism but see themselves as powerless. That is why George
Osborne is kowtowing to the Chinese. Indeed, this nuclear Nanking has Little Britain written all over it!
A year after the Treaty of Nanking Hong Kong Island was given
to the British in perpetuity.
Therefore, it would only be fair to offer President Xi the Isle of Wight...in
perpetuity. No, no, no! I was only joking London. Is Britain about to make a dangerous choice between America and China? Only time will tell but London at least needs to think about it!
