National security is a serious matter. No one in Hong Kong needs to be reminded of that, given the brouhaha that complicated our decades-long efforts to pass Article 23, and the controversial passage of our national security law.
But there is contagion afoot, in the United States in particular, that has bled the concept of national security into virtually everything. As Tufts University’s Daniel Drezner wrote recently in Foreign Affairs: “From climate change to ransomware to personal protective equipment to critical minerals to artificial intelligence (AI), everything is national security now.”
The list of such threats in the 2022 US national security strategy report included energy, nuclear power, terrorism (domestic, international and cyber), drugs, AI, international criminal organisations, critical minerals, food security (from cultivation to consumption), supply chains, the Mexican border and immigration.
You can add Chinese port cranes, which might illicitly monitor port activity, biotechnology and all electric vehicles, which US President Joe Biden has described as “smartphones on wheels”.
For me, the tipping point was when Grindr, the China-owned gay dating app, was accused of being a national security threat. US officials said it had the potential to compromise or blackmail gays in government or the US military.
I am not saying this would not have been technically possible, but common sense tells me that if Chinese spooks wanted to track down gays in the military, they have easier ways, like signing up to any one of dozens of other non-Chinese-owned dating sites.
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US says gay dating app Grindr poses national security risk due to Chinese ownership
US says gay dating app Grindr poses national security risk due to Chinese ownership
I am similarly incredulous that TikTok could pose a national security threat, arising from nameless Chinese organisations mining data or seeding disinformation and misinformation, by providing biased content or censoring content not flattering to China.
As William Reinsch at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, wrote: “It is not clear, at least to me, for what nefarious purposes the Chinese could use the data, which is essentially the same as Facebook, LinkedIn and other apps gather.”
Americans are exposed to media bias all the time, he pointed out: “All involve the purveyance of lies over truth. Whether they are Chinese lies, Russian lies or American lies is not critical.”
The angst should primarily be over the lies, not that they might come from China.
“We’ve seen this before in the Red Scare of the 1920s, the McCarthy (Joe, not Kevin) era in the 1950s, and on a lesser scale Japan-bashing in the 1980s,” he added. “Those did not dignify us as a society, and in practical terms they accomplished very little.”
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‘Pro-democracy activist’ convicted of acting as covert Chinese agent in US
‘Pro-democracy activist’ convicted of acting as covert Chinese agent in US
The proliferation of threats to national security is making the concept increasingly meaningless. “If everything is defined as national security, nothing is a national security priority,” said Drezner.
It becomes harder to focus on what matters most and, he added, “makes it easy for a multitude of potential threats to obscure the most imminent danger”– suggesting it contributed to the US government being blindsided by events including September 11, the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan, the Covid-19 pandemic and the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel.
He also complains about cynical misuse of the term by “policy entrepreneurs” who “want the administration, members of Congress, and other shapers of US foreign policy to label their issue a national security priority, in the hope of gaining more attention and resources”.
The US needs to “rightsize” its national security concept, he said, which would not only reduce budget stress but also make the real, grave and most imminent threats much more visible.
But getting true national security threats into proper perspective is likely to be challenging. That’s especially so when the Pentagon and military defence are better funded than the State Department, and it is much easier to get funds for defence than diplomacy. The concept has also been extremely useful – as a fig leaf to stay compliant with the World Trade Organization – to justify tariffs and provide cover for protectionism.
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An unwinnable conflict? The US-China trade war, 5 years on
An unwinnable conflict? The US-China trade war, 5 years on
Most challenging of all, however, is that the angst over national security is deeply embedded in a psychology of fear. In his book, America the Fearful, Benjamin Radford writes about the powerful role of fear in clouding perceptions in the US. Tracking the phantom fears amplified by social media, Radford calls on Americans to sort out legitimate threats from amplified exaggerations.
In The Psychology of a Superpower, Christopher Fettweis examines the exceptionalism at the heart of US foreign policy and suggests it fosters an American need to control everything from trade to conflict. He dismisses much of American worrying as unrealistic and frivolous, and links increasing power with an increasing paranoia associated with losing power.
There is a deep paradox here that cuts to the heart of America’s obsession with national security. First, and despite widespread US views that it is surrounded by grave and imminent threats, international polls regularly describe the US as among the greatest threats to world peace, even democracy.
Second, its greatest security threats are increasingly domestic. For the first time in 16 years, the Council on Foreign Relations’ Preventive Priorities Survey has found that the leading national security concern is not a foreign threat but the possibility of domestic terrorism and acts of political violence, particularly around the coming presidential election.
Yes, national security is a serious matter. But, as Reinsch concluded: “Instead of acting out of fear, we should be acting out of strength.”
David Dodwell is CEO of the trade policy and international relations consultancy Strategic Access, focused on developments and challenges facing the Asia-Pacific over the past four decades
