Not friends. Not enemies. Where to now for Nato on China?
- A new report says Beijing poses challenges to democratic countries and the transatlantic alliance must work together to meet them
- The report points to a bigger shift in Europe on the Asian giant towards the US position
For now, China is not an immediate military threat on the scale of Russia.
But as the Asian nation extends its power, global reach and ambitions, it poses challenges to open and democratic countries.
The assessment in the “Nato 2030” report reflects a bigger, more hawkish shift in Europe on China over the last year.
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China's military rise poses ‘important challenges’ to security, Nato says
For the large part, European politicians have been less critical about China than their US counterparts, particularly during the presidency of Donald Trump.
But in the last two years, the US progressively lobbied European partners – many of which are also part of Nato – on 5G technology. Among the major US claims is that China’s world-leading communications supplier Huawei Technologies is a national security risk and a threat to transatlantic intelligence sharing.
At the time, there was still no indication of much European military interest in China but more recently, European defence ministers – an important part of Nato – have taken a sharper tone, most notably Germany’s Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer who has called for a transatlantic alliance with the US to confront China.
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While that threat is not yet a direct military one, China is more than an economic player, according to the Nato 2030 report released on Tuesday.
“The scale of Chinese power and global reach poses acute challenges to open and democratic societies, particularly because of that country’s trajectory to greater authoritarianism and an expansion of its territorial ambitions,” the report said.
Professor Luis Simon, a Nato expert from the Free University of Brussels and Elcano Royal Institute think tank, said the report presented competition with China “not in naked power terms of the US vs China, but as part of a broader ideological ... clash of democracy vs autocracy”.
“Incidentally, this allows for a move from Trump’s ‘US vs China’ to a ‘West vs China’ pitch,” Simon said.
For Beijing, the most surprising remark in the Nato report was the reference to China as a threat facing Europe, according to a person with knowledge of the thinking of the Chinese delegation to the European Union. Both the EU and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation are headquartered in Brussels. All Nato members, apart from the United States and Canada, are in Europe.
“Europe is not yet designating China as a threat, it may come later,” Antoine Bondaz, a China specialist at the Foundation for Strategic Research, a Paris-based think tank. “But for sure, China is becoming an issue of concern since Chinese military capacities are being displayed closer to Europe: from the Arctic to the Mediterranean Sea, as well as in cyber and space.”
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Stoltenberg spelt out that threat in blunt terms in an interview with a German newspaper in June, saying: “One thing is clear: China is coming ever closer to Europe’s doorstep. Nato allies must face this challenge together.”
Speaking after the report was published, Stoltenberg’s predecessor, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, told the Post: “The time has come to find a new formula given the size of Nato, the range of operations it undertakes, and how technology is changing modern warfare.
“With China expanding its military reach, malign strategic investment and disinformation campaigns into Nato’s orbit, the alliance will need to find new ways to coordinate our protection and resilience.”
Wess Mitchell, who was the top State Department official for Europe from 2017 to 2019 and co-chaired the group that wrote the 67-page report, said: “The really big message is that Nato has to adapt itself for an era of great power competition that includes not only Russia, but also China.”
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To that end, the EU has been actively seeking a renewed relationship with the US since the election of Joe Biden as the next US president, even though the policy focus so far has been on China’s non-military challenges.
China has sought to downplay the risks cited by Nato, with foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying asking the security alliance to have a “proper understanding” of her country.
But there are tensions between China and its neighbours that could complicate that “understanding”.
China’s renewed military conflicts with India this year have also played a part in hardening Europe’s view, not least because they coincided with the EU’s nascent diplomatic interest in the Indo-Pacific region, with India seen as a like-minded partner for Europe in the democratic part of Asia.
So much so that the report suggested Nato forge a partnership with India in the future. At the same time, all 27 EU leaders have confirmed a summit with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May in Porto, as Portugal assumes the rotating EU Council presidency.
Meanwhile, a planned summit between all 27 EU leaders and Chinese President Xi Jinping in the German city of Leipzig in September failed to happen.
“In foreign policy matters, the crown jewel of the Portuguese presidency will be [the summit with] Modi,” Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa said in November. “It is a meeting that I consider to be of utmost importance to Europe to emphasise the importance of the relationship with the whole Indo-Pacific region.”
