Pompeo visit will push hawkish MPs to take even harder line on China

It is illustrative of the foreign policy gulf between Europe and America that, despite becoming the most Sino-sceptic country in Europe, even Britain’s position on China remains more accommodating than the bipartisan consensus in Washington. This will be highlighted today by means of the chronology that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s visit will take.

While the trip has been characterised as a victory lap, Pompeo will meet first with hawkish Conservative backbenchers and hard-line Labour MPs before visiting Downing Street. The message is that, far from the visit being purely celebratory, the United States is making clear its expectation that Britain should take an even firmer line towards Beijing.

In each of the steps taken in recent weeks to rebuke Beijing’s belligerent behaviour Conservative Sino-sceptics, and their powerful new American ally, will find elements to criticise. We may be removing Huawei equipment from our 5G network, but it remains in 3G and 4G, and in any case will take seven years to complete.

The decision to create a new pathway to citizenship for Hongkongers was an admirable step, but it is a lifeboat policy – defensive rather than offensive. Yesterday’s suspension of the extradition treaty with Hong Kong will not have come as a surprise to Beijing; it is a natural consequence of the end of “one country, two systems”, which has long been evident for the world to see.

Pompeo may today ask the government to speed up the removal of Huawei equipment, and as Reaction revealed last week, senior Conservative backbenchers intend to table amendments on the matter to the upcoming Telecoms Infrastructure Bill. The main focus, however, is on where the government has yet to take any action.

Tom Tugendhat, Iain Duncan Smith, and Bob Seely, all senior members of the newly-formed China Research Group, have raised questions about the video-sharing app Tik Tok, whose parent company, Bytedance, is believed to be under the thumb of the Chinese government. The Americans are considering banning the app outright – Pompeo is likely to find a good deal of support among MPs during his visit today.

Pompeo’s meeting with Labour MPs, which will also take place before his visit to Number 10, will cause the most political angst in Downing Street. It will signal once again to the British public that the Corbyn years are truly over, and may boost calls for direct sanctions on Chinese citizens.

Lisa Nandy, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, has called for Magnitsky-style sanctions to be imposed on Chinese officials involved in human rights violations against the Uighur population in Xinjiang. This would inevitably include senior members of the Chinese Communist Party. It would also be more difficult to defend on the grounds of protecting national security; China will consider it a much more antagonistic position than that taken over Huawei.

Ultimately, Pompeo’s visit signals a new era in British foreign policy where, much as in Washington, a new cross-party consensus is forming around rejecting Chinese hegemony. It was notable that when Trump claimed personal victory over the Huawei volte-face, Opposition MPs didn’t make a big deal of it. This time, they too are on the same page as Trump.

Downing Street will be assessing the costs of becoming an actor in this new cold war. British universities will likely see a reduction in Chinese students; the delivery of gigabyte broadband will be delayed; British institutions will come under heightened cyber-attacks; and the City may see less of Chinese money.

Both Tory rebels and the Labour opposition are cognisant of these facts. They have judged, however, that the threat China poses to the liberal world is too great to ignore.