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The U.S. is “waking up, but we’re waking up too slowly” to the growing threats posed by China, Rep. Mike Gallagher said this week, arguing that the Biden administration is failing to take the military and economic steps necessary to put America in a position to win its 21st-century showdown with the rising communist military and economic superpower.
In a wide-ranging interview with The Washington Times, Mr. Gallagher sketched out the House GOP’s plans to confront Beijing when the party takes control of the chamber in January.
The Wisconsin Republican and Marine Corps veteran is set to be chairman of the new House Select Committee on China, a panel that GOP leaders envision as a sweeping forum in which lawmakers can grapple with what critics say are China’s militarization of the South China Sea, its theft of American intellectual property, its economic coercion of the developing world, and a host of other issues.
Throughout the past two decades under administrations of both parties, Mr. Gallagher said, Washington has failed to act with the urgency needed to deal with a defining international challenge. He also said the Biden administration’s Pentagon still lacks an adequate plan to counter a theoretical Chinese attack on the island of Taiwan, one that Chinese President Xi Jinping pointedly refused to rule out.
But Mr. Gallagher says he is heartened to see that concern about Beijing appears to be bipartisan.
“I think we’re waking up, but we’re waking up too slowly to be sure,” Mr. Gallagher said. “What gives me hope is both parties are starting to say some of the right things on China. On the Republican side, I think we’re more forward-leaning on saying the biggest national security threat we face is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), whereas the Democrats are torn between that and climate change and tend to favor the latter over the former.”
“Where the divide is more pronounced has less to do with Democrats and Republicans and more to do with, let’s say, industry [and] Wall Street vs. those of us who come at this from a national security perspective,” he said. “You have a lot of major asset managers that continue to plow American money into China.”
Despite the tensions in the relationship, China remains the U.
