Communist China and the Free World's Future
"Communist China and the Free World's Future" is the name of a speech given by United States Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo on 23 July 2020 at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in California. In the speech Pompeo rallied that the free world should come together and induce China to change.
Background
On 21 July, Mike Pompeo "urged 'the entire world' to stand up to China". On 23 July 2020, a day before the speech, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced that the Chinese Consulate-General in Houston, Texas, was ordered to shut operations within 72 hours by the United States government. Prior to this US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was in Europe "rallying leaders to take a harder line with Beijing and meeting with exiled Chinese dissidents".Speech
Mike Pompeo spoke after remarks by National Security Advisor Robert C. O'Brien, FBI Director Christopher A. Wray, and the Attorney General William Barr. Pompeo mentioned that while these remarks covered ideology, espionage and economics, he would put it all together and "detail what the China threat means for our economy, for our liberty, and indeed for the future of free democracies around the world."Pompeo's speech brought into question 50 years of engagement between the United States and China. He said that that if the world was to remain free, "the old paradigm of blind engagement with China simply won't get it done." He referred to China's handling of and response to the novel coronavirus, Hong Kong, Xinjiang, Chinese trade abuses and a Chinese military that is growing "more menacing". However, Pompeo distinguishes between the Chinese people and the Chinese Communist Party saying, "we must also engage and empower the Chinese people...a dynamic, freedom-loving people who are completely distinct from the Chinese Communist Party". He says "the biggest lie is that the Chinese Communist Party speaks for 1.4 billion people who are surveilled, oppressed and scared to speak out", whereas in reality the "CCP fears the Chinese people’s honest opinions more than any foreign foe". He also says "General Secretary Xi Jinping is a true believer in a bankrupt totalitarian ideology". Pompeo called upon the free world to come together to induce China to change.
Free world
Mike Pompeo referred to the "free world" in his speech a couple of times. He referred to the struggle between the free world and communist powers like the CCP. The struggle against those who want a "tributary international system where smaller countries are deferential to larger powers, instead of a rules-based international order where small countries enjoy equal rights." The struggle against the CCP which has no regard for universal rights or open markets. Pompeo said that the free world had nurtured China into a healthy economy, and in return the Chinese Communist Party was now exploiting the free world.Richard Nixon
Mike Pompeo referred to Richard Nixon's engagement policy with China and an article in which Nixon had written in relation to China, "the world cannot be safe until China changes" and that America's "goal should be to induce change". Pompeo also referred to President Nixon's reference of the CCP having become a "Frankenstein".Soviet Union
Mike Pompeo said that some of the mistakes the Soviet Union had made in the past were now being made by the CCP. He also made some differentiation between the Soviet Union and the CCP, such as the greater integration of China in the global scenario. Pompeo also referred to President Ronald Reagan's usage of the phrase, trust, but verify, for the Soviet Union. Pompeo put forward a variation that should be used for the CCP, "distrust and verify".Chinese dissidents
Pompeo referenced Nathan Law, Wei Jingsheng and Wang Dan in his speech. Both Wei and Wang were present in the audience and Pompeo requested them to make their presence known. Pompeo called Wei Jingsheng the "father of the Chinese democracy movement" and Wang Dan, a Tiananmen Square survivor, as "a key student who has never stopped fighting for freedom for the Chinese people." Pompeo said that in the past US leaders had all too often "ignored or downplayed the words of brave Chinese dissidents who warned us about the nature of the regime we're facing" and that US engagement with dissidents was going to increase.Hollywood
Pompeo stated that Hollywood, "the epicenter of American creative freedom, and self-appointed arbiters of social justice – self-censors even the most mildly unfavorable reference to China."Response
China's response to the speech was considered as "surprisingly mild" by James Palmer in the Foreign Policy. This milder response was attributed to " recent diplomatic disasters" by China. Hua Chunying, a senior Chinese diplomat tweeted that Mike Pompeo's "speech at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library suggests that he wants to present himself as the John Foster Dulles of the 21st century, launching a new crusade against China in a globalized world. What he is doing is as futile as an ant trying to shake a tree." She continued, "It's about time that all peace-loving people around the world stepped forward to prevent him from doing the world more harm."Hugh Hewitt, president of the Richard Nixon Foundation, said that "this was a speech that will be seen as pivotal by foreign policy historians for years to come". Richard N. Haass noted in his article titled, "What Mike Pompeo doesn’t understand about China, Richard Nixon and U.S. foreign policy" and published in The Washington Post, was that Pompeo made numerous misrepresentations of history in his speech and failed to suggest a way forward. Thomas Wright, in his Brookings article titled "Pompeo's Surreal Speech on China", compared statements of Pompeo to that of Matthew Pottinger's. He also said that while Pompeo invoked the free world, nothing was said of the free world or the trouble it was in. Thomas Wright ends by quoting Kelly Magsamen of the Center for American Progress, "Rather than organizing U.S. foreign policy purely around competition with China we should be organizing it around our democratic allies with the goal of strengthening and catalyzing the free world". Scott Kennedy of the Center for Strategic and International Studies commented that "How do you form a united front against China when the U.S. is bullying its allies, trashing multilateral institutions and pushing an economic decoupling that no one else supports?"