PM Turnbull: China lacks "any hostile intent." Yeah, sure.

   China is not a threat to Australia because it lacks “any hostile intent”, Malcolm Turnbull has said as he embarks on his US visit.

   Speaking to Sky News on Thursday, the Australian prime minister sought to play down a more hostile approach to China by the US, rejecting the “out-of-date cold-war prism” of seeing the two superpowers as in competition.  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/22/china-is-no-threat-to-australia-turnbull-says-before-visit-to-us

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2-14-18      

 

     U.S. intelligence leaders warned Congress Tuesday that China poses a major security threat by stealing and buying sensitive American technology. …

  Chinese technology collectors are focusing on smaller startup companies that are not well informed about the Chinese threat, Wray noted.  "The reality is that the Chinese have turned more and more to more creative avenues, using nontraditional collectors, which I think we in the intelligence community recognize, but I think the private sector is not used to spotting," Wray said….

  Cornyn is co-sponsoring legislation that would increase the power of CFIUS to check illicit Chinese technology gathering efforts, something he said is "extraordinarily important."

"China has weaponized investment in an attempt to vacuum up our advanced technologies and simultaneously undermine our defense industrial base," said Cornyn, who is the Senate Majority Whip, the second highest-ranking Republican in the chamber.  "As it acquires U.S. firms, and technology, and intellectual property, as well as the know-how to put it to use, the risk is that the Chinese government, which has its tentacles not just in state-owned Chinese companies but also in so-called private Chinese firms, that it will get its hands on these capabilities and use them against us.” …

  HNA, according to U.S. officials, misled the CFIUS during two reviews of proposed purchases of American companies by not fully disclosing that the company, worth an estimated $100 billion, is partially owned by members Communist Party of China, some of whom are current Chinese government officials.

  Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) warned that China poses a long-term threat to U.S. security.

"The biggest issue of our time, in my view and, I think, in the view of most of the members of this committee and I would venture to guess, most of the members of this panel, is China and the risk they pose," Rubio said.  "I'm not sure in the 240-some-odd-year history of this nation we've ever faced a competitor and potential adversary of this scale, scope, and capacity." …

   The intelligence assessments are "a very, very deep dive into what China's plan is doing now and what their plans are for the future and how it would impact the United States," DNI Coats said.  http://freebeacon.com/national-security/intel-chiefs-sound-alarm-china-threat/