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Two U.S. agencies, the FBI and the Department of Energy, now agree that COVID-19 likely emerged from a leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Since the Energy Department’s assessment is based on new information which will be shared, other official groups will presumably arrive at the same conclusion.
Suppose that a year from now U.S. intel agencies agree that the Chinese government created COVID-19 in a laboratory, lied about it and withheld information that allowed the deadly virus to run riot across the globe. What should President Biden do? How should China be held accountable for nearly seven million deaths worldwide and untold economic destruction?
China must pay a price. Biden will have to assemble a coalition of countries finally willing to push back against China’s carelessness and deception about COVID-19, as well as its ongoing theft of intellectual property, disregard for human rights, dishonest posturing about climate change and economic coercion. It is time. For over a decade the free world, in thrall to the economic opportunities of a growing China, has looked the other way as Beijing has allowed rampant cyberattacks, stolen billions of dollars in patents and know-how, lied about its military ambitions in the South China Sea and elsewhere, and cheated on international rules and standards.
Despite being a member of the World Trade Organization, which prohibits such activities, China routinely punishes other countries for what they view as hostile measures by blackballing imports of that nation’s goods. For instance, when officials in Canberra barred Huawei and ZTE from its 5G network and demanded a strenuous investigation into the origins of COVID-19, China retaliated by banning imports of Australian coal, beef, copper, wine, lobsters, beer and other key goods.
Such moves are meant to weaken antagonistic countries, but both sides can play that game. The U.S. and its allies could similarly target and ban goods from China that can be bought elsewhere, which would not only punish Beijing’s interests but also accelerate the exodus of manufacturers from China.
