China-US Graphic: GT

The US intelligence community released another "biased" report on Tuesday hyping "China threat" rhetoric, over which a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Wednesday "the US is making excuses to contain and suppress China and maintain its own hegemony."

The 31-page report of the Annual Threat Assessment by the intelligence community published on Tuesday encompasses almost all the "threat labels" created by the US in the political and security domains. China remains the US' top military and cyber threat, according to the report which claims Beijing was making "steady but uneven" progress on capabilities it could use to capture Taiwan, the Guardian reported. China has the ability to hit the US with conventional weapons, compromise US infrastructure through cyber-attacks, and target its assets in space, as well as seeking to displace the US as the top AI power by 2030, the report said.

Released ahead of testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee by President Donald Trump's intelligence chiefs, the report said China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) likely planned to use large language models to create fake news, imitate personas and enable attack networks.

"China's military is fielding advanced capabilities, including hypersonic weapons, stealth aircraft, advanced submarines, stronger space and cyber warfare assets and a larger arsenal of nuclear weapons," Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told the committee. She labeled Beijing as Washington's "most capable strategic competitor." 

Chinese FM spokesperson Guo Jiakun said the US issues irresponsible and biased reports like this year after year, seeks to promote the false "China threat" narrative and fans up major-country rivalry, so that there could be an excuse to suppress China and perpetuate US supremacy.

We have no intention to surpass or supplant anyone, said Guo, adding "to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail." China is not a mirror image of the hegemonic US. "The US should stop falsely picturing China as a threat and work with China for a steady, sound and sustainable China-US relationship," said Guo.

US intelligence officials also groundlessly blamed China for fentanyl crisis in the country. According to Reuters, CIA Director John Ratcliffe told the committee that China had made only "intermittent" efforts to curtail the flow of precursor chemicals fueling the US fentanyl crisis due to its reluctance to crack down on lucrative Chinese businesses.

Chinese experts view the report as more proof of the US' intention to focus more of its resources on strategic competition and confrontation with China.

A key difference from last year's report is the shift in focus, said some experts. The new report shows that the US is now devoting more efforts to intensify strategic confrontation with China in the security sector, Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times, noting this underpins the intensified hype around the "China threat" rhetoric.

A Global Times reporter noticed that the Annual Threat Assessment published last year mentioned China 91 times, while this year's report mentions China 103 times. 

Last year's report noted that "China has the capability to directly compete with the United States and US allies and to alter the rules-based global order in ways that support Beijing's power and form of governance over that of the United States."

Thief crying 'stop thief'

During opening remarks at the Senate's US Annual Threat Assessment hearing, Senator Tom Cotton, who chairs the Intelligence Committee, said that "For the first time, the annual threat assessment lists foreign illicit drug actors as the very first threat to our country," as he singled out "Mexican-based cartels using precursors [industrial chemicals] produced in China," NPR reported.

This is clearly a case of a "thief crying 'stop thief'," Li Haidong, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University told the Global Times, noting that the US knows it cannot fundamentally resolve its fentanyl crisis, so just as before, it deflects blame onto countries like China and Mexico.

The goal [of those politicians] is to put on a tough posture and rally public support. At the same time, they are also exploiting the high public attention on the fentanyl issue in the US to provide so-called justifications for the tariff war, Li noted. 

Lin Jian, a spokesperson from China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in February that China has given support to the US's response to the fentanyl issue in the spirit of humanity. The fentanyl issue is just an excuse the US uses to impose tariffs on and pressure and blackmail China, and they punish us for helping them. This will not solve their concerns, Lin said.

China's General Administration of Customs (GAC) said on Monday that China has upheld strict regulations and adopted comprehensive measures to maintain an intense crackdown on the smuggling of fentanyl-related substances.

The measures include strengthening the analysis and assessment of smuggling risks related to fentanyl-related substances and increasing inspection and control efforts, said an official with the GAC in response to a media inquiry.

China's Cybersecurity Industry Alliance released a study on Tuesday titled Mobile Cyberattacks Conducted by US Intelligence Agencies, which is based on the investigation and analysis results disclosed by global cybersecurity vendors, research institutions and scholars.

The Tuesday study thoroughly exposes how US intelligence agencies relentlessly target global mobile smart terminals and communication systems to build comprehensive attack and penetration capabilities. These extensive, long-term intrusions into global mobile networks pose serious threats to national security of countries around the world. 

As the US seeks a resolution to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, it has strengthened its efforts to take on China as its greatest imaginary enemy, Song Zhongping, a Chinese military affairs expert, told the Global Times. He noted that various versions of reports to hype up the "China threat" rhetoric published by the US are nothing more than finding excuses for its own military expansion and maintaining its hegemony.

The report in fact reflects the anxiety, nervousness and diffidence of the US in face of China's development, Li said. Washington is anxious about how to maintain dominance in defining the basic rules of the new international system and order and how to make the existing international order and system develop in line with the interests of the US and its so-called values.