
China's unquestioned drone supremacy is by far our greatest threat
Outwardly, Beijing continues to pretend that its stance on Ukraine focuses on 'negotiation, ceasefire and peace'. But this neutral façade has worn away to a vanishing point. President von der Leyen recently accused China of 'de facto enabling Russia's war economy', and noted that how it 'continues to interact with Putin's war will be a determining factor for EU-China relations'. More recently the European Union head of foreign policy has called Beijing the 'key enabler of Russia's war in Ukraine'.
Brussels has already sanctioned Chinese companies for selling goods that have been used for weapons production in Russia. China continues to pressurise the EU not to enforce trade measures to China's disadvantage. Today, Xi has pointedly warned the EU not to make wrong strategic decisions about China. But what strategic decisions has he made that would give grounds for greater confidence in China's bona fides towards Europe?
From a geopolitical perspective, China's position is entirely clear. Xi values his expedient alliance with Putin in opposition to the US far more even than China's economic foothold in the EU market. The tense and combative tone of Beijing's approach to the EU summit contrasts strongly with the atmospherics of Xi's May Day visit to Moscow this year as Putin's guest of honour, even as Russia was stepping up its brutal assault on a geographical Europe's second-largest country.
Xi's 'strategic choice' is not in Europe's favour. Earlier this month, China's foreign minister Wang Yi told his European counterpart that 'China cannot accept Russia losing its war against Ukraine' since this would enable the US to turn its full attention to contesting with China. This unusually stark formulation wipes out at a stroke China's carefully cultivated outward pose of peaceful neutrality. But in truth, there is nothing neutral about existing Chinese engagement on the ground.
Earlier this week Ukrainian intelligence announced that it had retrieved two drones, apparently in use as decoys against Ukrainian air defences, which were entirely made of Chinese components. These items join a formidable list of other Chinese materiel found in Ukraine. Russia has recently deployed a Chinese-made laser system, the Silent Hunter, which locks on to, blinds and destroys Ukrainian drones. Chinese-made engines powered Geran-2 combat drones used to grim effect in a recent surge of attacks on Kyiv. The US government assesses that China 'provides nearly 80 per cent of the dual-use items Russia needs to sustain the war'.
Xi has made his strategic choice; to back Putin's attack on Europe on the battlefield. In these circumstances, to claim as China does that it is not a 'systemic rival' is absurd. China is an enemy of Europe, as it is of Britain, and the sooner this results in strengthening Nato and individual Western defence policies against China, the better.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Hong Kong issues arrest warrants for 19 activists based overseas
Hong Kong's national security police have issued arrest warrants for 19 activists based overseas, accusing them of subversion under a stringent national security law, marking the largest such tally yet. They are accused of organising or participating in the Hong Kong Parliament, a pro-democracy group that authorities in the Asian financial hub say intended to subvert state power, under the law Beijing imposed in 2020 after months of pro-democracy protests in 2019. The activists are accused of having launched a referendum or run as candidates in the unofficial Hong Kong Parliament group, which authorities say aims to achieve self-determination and draft a Hong Kong constitution. Police said the organisation sought to overthrow the governments of China and Hong Kong by unlawful means, and that further arrests may follow. Among those named are the businessman Elmer Yuen, the commentator Victor Ho, and the activists Johnny Fok and Tony Choi. Four of them are subject to previous arrest warrants, each carrying a reward of 1m Hong Kong dollars (£95,000). Among the remaining 15, for each of whom police are offering a reward of 200,000 Hong Kong dollars, are those said to have organised or run in the election and been sworn in as its councillors. Feng Chongyi, a China studies professor at the University of Technology Sydney who was also listed, decried the bounty against him as 'ridiculous'. 'They've got the power, they've got the influence overseas, they want to control everything even overseas,' he told the Sydney Morning Herald. The UK's foreign and home secretaries condemned the move in a joint statement, calling the arrests 'another example of transnational repression' and saying it damages Hong Kong's international reputation. '[The UK] will not tolerate attempts by foreign governments to coerce, intimidate, harass or harm their critics overseas,' they said in a statement on Friday. In response, the Chinese embassy in the UK said the British government's remarks 'constitute a gross interference' in China's internal affairs and the rule of law in Hong Kong. 'China urges the UK to abandon its colonial mentality, stop interfering in Hong Kong affairs … stop shielding criminals,' it said. Australia's foreign minister, Penny Wong, also strongly objected to the arrest warrants. 'Freedom of expression and assembly are essential to our democracy,' she said on X. 'We have consistently expressed our strong objections to China and Hong Kong on the broad and extraterritorial application of Hong Kong's national security legislation, and we will continue to do so.' The former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997 with the guarantee of a high degree of autonomy, including freedom of speech, under a 'one country, two systems' formula. Critics of the national security law say government are using it to stifle dissent. Chinese and Hong Kong authorities have repeatedly said the law was vital to restore stability after the city was rocked for months by sometimes violent anti-government and anti-China protests in 2019. Police reiterated that national security offences were serious crimes with extraterritorial reach and urged the wanted individuals to return to Hong Kong and surrender. 'If offenders voluntarily give up continuing to violate the crime, turn themselves in, truthfully confess their crimes, or provide key information that helps solve other cases, they may be eligible for reduced punishment,' they said in a statement. Police also said that aiding, abetting, or funding others to participate in the Hong Kong Parliament group could be a criminal offence.


Reuters
4 hours ago
- Reuters
EU chief von der Leyen heads to Scotland for trade talks with Trump
BRUSSELS/EDINBURGH, July 26 (Reuters) - EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen headed to Scotland on Saturday ahead of a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday afternoon, commission spokespeople said, as EU officials said the two sides were nearing a trade agreement. Trump, in Scotland for a few days of golfing and bilateral meetings, told reporters upon his arrival on Friday evening that he was looking forward to meeting with von der Leyen, calling her a "highly respected" leader. He repeated his view that there was a 50-50 chance that the U.S. and the 27-member European Union could reach a framework trade pact, adding that Brussels wanted to "make a deal very badly". If it happened, he said it would be the biggest trade agreement reached yet by his administration, surpassing the $550 billion accord agreed with Japan earlier this week. The White House has released no details about the planned meeting or the terms of the emerging agreement. The European Commission on Thursday said a negotiated trade solution with the United States was within reach, even as EU members voted to approve counter-tariffs on 93 billion euros ($109 billion) of U.S. goods in case the talks collapse. To get a deal, Trump said the EU would have to "buy down" that tariff rate, although he gave no specifics. EU diplomats say a possible deal between Washington and Brussels would likely include a broad 15% tariff on EU goods imported into the U.S., mirroring the U.S.-Japan deal, along with a 50% tariff on European steel and aluminum. The broad tariff rate would be half the 30% duties that Trump has threatened to slap on EU goods from August 1. It remains unclear if Washington will agree to exempt the EU from sectoral tariffs on automobiles, pharmaceuticals and other goods that have already been announced or are pending. Combining goods, services and investment, the EU and the United States are each other's largest trading partners by far. The American Chamber of Commerce in Brussels warned in March that any conflict jeopardized $9.5 trillion of business in the world's most important commercial relationship.


Telegraph
5 hours ago
- Telegraph
The IDF are supreme in warfare, so their enemies wage lawfare instead
Belgium this week detained and interrogated two Israelis at the Tomorrowland music festival. Perhaps the fictional Belgian detective Tintin would have been better tasked with handling the case, but it was apparently taken seriously by the equally cartoonish Belgian authorities. The allegations from anti-Israel campaigners were that the two Israelis served in the Israeli Defence Forces, arguably the most effective military in the world and, contrary to anti-Semitic histrionics, the most successful in avoiding civilian casualties. Statistically they are far better in their ratio of civilian to military deaths in conflict than either British or American forces, according to John Spencer, Chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point Military Academy, who has spent a career analysing these things. It's curious, isn't it, that the hardline activists pursuing Israelis aren't targeting the 100,000 Druze or the several thousand Muslim and Bedouin Israelis who proudly serve in the IDF alongside their Jewish neighbours. But the IDF are predominantly Jewish and therefore treated differently. They can't be beaten on the battlefield so there are attempts to beat them on the field of lawfare. The seasoned legal antiheroes of the lawfare minefields, wounded occasionally by vicious papercuts and exploding judges, take no prisoners in their courtroom battles against Jews – as the International Criminal Court has shown. You might think the Belgians would be a little more cognisant of their own history before picking on any more minorities. The story of the Belgian Congo would have made Cecil Rhodes blush. The Second World War saw 28,000 Belgian Jews murdered during the Holocaust, from a total of just 66,000 living there in 1940. In Antwerp, in 1941, the Belgian authorities helped organise the conscription of Jews for forced labour in France and aided in the rounding up of Jews for the Nazis in 1942. But these lessons of the past are going unheeded. Won't anyone think of the hypocrisy? Quite a few Belgians join the French Foreign Legion. Has anyone ever prosecuted those soldiers? After all, the Legion's conduct in the Algerian Coup attempt of 1961 is hardly edifying. The UK of course is a world leader in lawfare. We have 147,000 serving military personnel but 177,000 practising lawyers! Our battalions of bewigged barristers vastly outnumber our bedevilled bearskins. The UK certainly isn't immune to this offensive targeting of Israel through the courts. A few months ago, British lawyers attempted to persuade Scotland Yard to prosecute some British Jews who have joined the Israeli armed forces. These are presumably young British Jews wanting to help protect fellow Jews from certain annihilation if no such force existed. Has anyone ever prosecuted Brits who joined the French Foreign Legion? Or those fighting for Ukraine today? Did anyone prosecute idealistic youths who went to participate in the Spanish Civil War? Of course not. Meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary David Lammy's posturing in the Commons this week demanding Israel adopt a ceasefire despite it being Hamas that has rejected multiple ceasefires, was itself akin to a pound-shop Lord Palmerston. Ironically of course Palmerston's reputation for 'gunboat diplomacy' originated in large part because he wanted to protect a Jewish British subject – Don Pacifico – from an anti-Semitic mob in 1850s Athens. Nowadays, by contrast, the only time the Foreign Office ever adopts an imperialist air is when it is disproportionately attacking the world's only Jewish state. Perhaps the Belgians should stick to making chocolates, although to be frank, if the originally Parisian Bond Street chocolatier Charbonnel et Walker are anything to go by, the French are better at that anyway.