As Europeans have been left reeling by the events of recent weeks which appear to spell the end of the transatlantic alliance as we know it, China sees an opportunity. Indeed, when China’s foreign minister Wang Yi took the stage at the Munich Security Conference, he not only called for Europe to take part in the negotiations for peace in Ukraine, but also proposed a wider rethink in Sino-European relations.
Although Wang Yi endorsed the bilateral Russia–US negotiations mere days later (and China’s role in the Ukraine war has been far from benign), some European leaders, such as Spain’s foreign minister José Manuel Albares, have expressed willingness to take Beijing up on the offer. Resetting the relationship with Beijing may indeed offer some opportunities – not in the least the ability to hedge between China and the US – but it also comes with significant risks.
Hedging between China and the US
Many European leaders will see an opportunity to signal closer ties with China as leverage to secure continued commitments from the US. Such a strategy could well generate some success. Despite Europe’s crisis of confidence, it holds some very significant cards in the US–China–Europe triangle.
Access to the European market is still indispensable for both China and the US. The United States will furthermore still expect Europe – which remains far more economically entangled with China than the US is – to join the sanctions that would follow a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, and participate in export controls on strategic technologies. As the transatlantic relationship becomes more transactional, Europeans may well start to use this continued alignment on the China security question as a bargaining chip.
There are several ongoing flashpoints where we could start to see this strategy be applied. One such example is ASML, the Dutch tech giant whose monopoly on highly specialized lithography machines played a pivotal role in the Biden administration’s strategy to choke off China’s ability to access or produce cutting-edge chips. Though shrouded in language of partnerships and alliances, the implementation of the original export controls on ASML involved significant pressure by the Biden team.
The restrictions have come at a significant cost for ASML. China was not only a key customer of its most high-end machines, but the controls have also allowed China to more rapidly start to catch up than they may otherwise have been incentivised to do – necessity is the mother of innovation. The Trump administration has reportedly pushed for even more stringent restrictions during backdoor meetings with the Dutch government.
Previous administrations were able to make these kinds of demands of its European allies because of what they offered in return. As the US retreats from its security and other commitments, and thus reduces its leverage, it remains to be seen how long its European partners will continue to play ball.
Europe could also seek to exploit Trump’s ambitions to counter growing Chinese influence in the Arctic. Such plans are in part predicated on the US getting access to more ice breakers. The US currently only has two ageing ships, while Russia has around 41, and China too has a rapidly growing fleet.
Trump has called for the delivery of 40 additional ice breakers, a policy line initiated by the Biden administration. But the US currently has no domestic manufacturing capacity or capability to build this type of ship, so the 2024 ICE Pact sought to partner with Finland and Canada. Though these plans do not appear to be on hold yet, here too the Europeans – and the similarly spurned Canadians – could hold significant leverage.
The China factor
China is often presented as the big winner of current geopolitical shifts, biding its time as the US knocks over the pillars on which its hegemony was built (never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake). But China also has much to lose from Trump’s geopolitical collision course. This could open a window for Europe to not only use closer alignment with Beijing as leverage in conversations with Washington, but also to get concessions from China.
An all-out tariff war with the US could significantly undermine an already brittle Chinese economy and would make Europe an even more important export market. China, like Europe, will be watching the apparent rapprochement between Russia and the US with great trepidation. If the Trump administration is able to pull off a ‘reverse Nixon’ and (partially) wean Russia off China, Beijing would see its hold over a no longer isolated Russia diminish significantly. A hastily brokered deal over Ukraine would also allow the US to refocus its efforts on the Indo-Pacific, which China naturally does not want.
Many European policymakers have long – and naively – hoped for a deus ex machina whereby Beijing would use its influence over the Kremlin to bring the war in Ukraine to an end. Despite the tectonic shifts over the past few weeks, Europe should not expect China’s posture on Ukraine to radically change. But there is now more space for alignment and reengagement between China and Europe, which could see momentum to convince Beijing to support a more equal, representative and durable peace process in Ukraine, among other European priorities.
Striking the right balance
Although Europe has multiple opportunities to chart a more independent and strategic course in the US–China–Europe triangle and leverage its existing strengths, it must go into this with eyes wide open.
Europe has finally woken up to the significant vulnerabilities it has allowed itself to become exposed to by becoming almost fully dependent on external actors for its security and other critical areas such as technology. These are dependencies which are at risk of being weaponized against it.
While some European countries may see quick wins in turning to Chinese alternatives to de-risk from the US, reducing exposure to dependencies on one actor should not be traded for further entrenching dependencies on another. Old problems in the China–EU relationship have not gone away simply because the world around it has changed.
