Sir Alex Younger said that in his experience as the former head of MI6 “just being nice” to China “doesn’t get you very far”.
Asked if China should be designated as a threat to the UK, Sir Alex told the BBC: “I tend to switch off when I hear ‘is a threat’, ‘isn’t a threat’, ‘we should call it a threat’, ‘we shouldn’t call it a threat’… China is a fact, it is a fifth of humanity, we need to geopolitically be capable of chewing gum and walking at the same time.
“Of course we need to engage with China, of course we need to compete against China in a way that it understands competition, by the way, linking economics and politics and security altogether.
“And sometimes we need to confront China and in my experience just being nice to them doesn’t get you very far.
“I am not aware of what the people who have entered this debate are talking about but if they are talking about the specific point of whether China should be designated within the terms of the National Security Act as a particular state of concern and therefore links to China should mandate additional reporting requirements, if it is about that my view is probably it should be.”
