Exclusive — Sen. Marco Rubio: ‘The Chinese Effort to Supplant America Has No Precedent’

The Chinese have been particularly interested in various ports around the world. For instance, Breitbart News Pentagon correspondent Kristina Wong last year visited one such port city in Gwadar, Pakistan, that the Chinese have invested heavily in. But Rubio says it’s not just in Pakistan, or just in Asia, where the Chinese are expanding their influence and capacities in various ports and port cities around the globe. In Greece, Rubio notes, the Chinese have built up significant control over ports. It’s even in Panama, where the United States had once invested significant resources to build the Panama Canal before eventually handing the Panama Canal Zone over to Panama’s government, among many other places, Rubio says. Rubio adds that this port strategy allows the Chinese to cause major headaches for the U.S. Navy without actually building a navy of its own to compete and allows the People’s Republic of China to compete for influence on the high seas with the United States despite significantly less of a physical presence.

“Ports are a good place to start. In the post-World War II order, one of the reasons why you saw a dramatic global economic expansion is freedom of navigation,” Rubio said. “You don’t have to worry about pirates or countries saying you can’t come through these waters. We have international waters, and by and large it’s the United States Navy that has kept shipping lanes open for free trade and stuff. So the Chinese have a choice to make: Are we going to build a navy to rival that, or all these ships eventually have to go into port somewhere? So, now, what they’ve decided to do, smartly, rather than try to compete with us outside of Asia on control of waterways, they just try to control the ports of entry around the world for trade. So in the Panama Canal, they’ve made massive investments on both ends of the canal. I believe they own all the ports in Greece. What they do is they go to these countries, they make incredible financial offers, frankly in many cases they bribe government officials to get these deals, and then what happens is not only do they control the ports but they can begin denying or charging exorbitant prices to foreign shippers that want to use those ports and then favorable or no price at all to Chinese shippers that want to use those ports. To top it all off, many of these ports are being developed in a way where they can provide rotational naval visits for Chinese vessels as well, meaning they don’t have to build naval bases—they can just keep building these commercial ports that the Chinese Navy can use in order to have a blue water navy that can reach anywhere on the planet.”

In exchange for the Chinese investment in these ports, Rubio adds, China expects these countries to back its views on world geopolitical affairs. For instance, in the case of Panama, after Chinese investments in its infrastructure, Panama switched its official allegiance from Taiwan to China in terms of nation recognition—a major development that empowers the Chinese. Technically, the old government of mainland China—once a military dictatorship, now a democracy, called the Republic of China—has fallen back to the island of Taiwan ever since Mao Zedong’s communist revolution on the mainland. The split infuriates Beijing, which has tried to aggressively bring Taiwan to heel, but western powers particularly the Vatican under Pope John Paul II stood up to the Chinese communists on behalf of the free people in Taiwan for decades. The United States has always backed Taiwan somewhat, without official recognition, but the Vatican’s support has been slipping under Pope Francis—allowing for some of these Latin American nations like Panama and others to change their recognition without much consequence. But it’s not just Taiwan versus China recognition, either, Rubio says, adding that the Chinese essentially expect complete capitulation in return for their investment including voting for the Chinese agenda at the United Nations and helping push other nations into submission.

“They’ve done this in place after place after place,” Rubio said. “Not only do these investments in these ports get them port rights, and they’re bribing people in the process to get them, but they also expect as a result of the investments you will support them in international forums—vote for them at the U.N., switch your international recognition from Taiwan to China, and they’re doing it not just with ports by the way, they’ll show up in an impoverished country with a couple billion dollars and as a result demand your support at international forums. Panama has done it, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, those are in our own hemisphere—three countries in the last four years. Panama is interesting because not only did they get Panama to switch in return for some of the investments they put in there at the Panama Canal, they also told them you have to help us flip a couple more countries. Invariably, at least once or twice a year we will hear from some western hemisphere country that will say ‘you know, we’re getting a lot of pressure from the Chinese, they’re sending us a lot of money to do this and that and the other,’ and so yeah, absolutely they are using every tool in their toolbox to further their narrative around the world.”

Rubio wrote an op-ed published last week in the Washington Post calling for President Trump to hang tough and hold out for a good deal with China rather than rushing into just any deal on trade to slow or stop tariffs.