Former Biden Official: US Likely Will Never Convince China to Stop Dual-Use Exports to Russia
A bipartisan Russian sanctions bill that would also target countries still doing certain business with Moscow may hurt Russia in the short term but also could further damage U.S. trade talks with China, said Nicholas Burns, U.S. ambassador to China during the Biden administration. And while Burns said he’s glad the Trump administration has maintained sanctions against Chinese companies for selling sensitive microelectronics to Russia, he said the U.S. likely will never be able to convince China to stop supporting Russia’s defense industrial base.
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Burns, speaking during an event this week hosted by the Brookings Institution, said the bill introduced by Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., in April is “intriguing.” In addition to new sanctions against Russia if it rejects peace talks with Ukraine, the bill would impose certain secondary sanctions on “actors” supporting Russia along with a 500% tariff on imported goods from countries that buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and other products (see 2506020060, 2505220052 and 2504020003).
It’s not quite a “nuclear option,” Burns said, but it would be close. It’s a “very tough option against Iran and China and India,” he said, referring to the nations that still do major business with Russia.
But Burns also said the bill may not fit well with the Trump administration’s China strategy. The administration is hoping to strike a trade deal with Beijing, and Burns said new secondary sanctions could torpedo those chances. He also said Russia would likely, over time, circumvent any new restrictions.
“We obviously need to have a trade deal between China and the United States by this autumn. It's important for us. It's important for the Chinese economy as well, and for what Xi Jinping wants to do,” Burns said. “So to deploy [new sanctions], would it hurt the Russians in the short term? It probably would. Would there be workarounds, because the Russians and Iranians and Chinese are champions in that? Probably.”
Burns acknowledged that he has been out of government for more than four months, and the Trump administration may have more information than he does about the “trade-offs” in that scenario.
President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio will have to gauge “how much value does [the bill] really bring us, and how many headaches does it cause us on the other things we're trying to do?”
Asked whether there’s anything the U.S. can do to get China to stop selling dual-use microelectronics to Russia, Burns said he is skeptical. “I don't think we can convince them not to give full-throated support for the Russian war machine,” he said. “They've made their choice, and they've even doubled down on the choice.”
Burns said he had a “million conversations” with the Chinese about their continued exports of microelectronics to Russia, and Beijing refused to acknowledge that it was supporting Russia’s war against Ukraine. “When we would put the facts in front of them -- just complete denial. We'd say the sky is blue, and they’d say no, the sky is black, etc.,” he said. “A dialogue of the deaf.”
He said the Biden administration tracked many shipments of microelectronics from China to Russia, although the administration drew a “red line” for shipments of weapons systems and other lethal support. Burns said the Biden administration “thought” Beijing never crossed that line, but the country has “done something probably equally or more important” by continuing to ship microelectronics.
Burns added that China has acted as a “protector of Russia” at the U.N. and they've also “done it with the critical dual-use technology that Chinese companies are selling.” He said “there's been no break in that.”
He said Beijing can’t be an “honest broker” in any peace talks with Moscow because they’re clearly siding with Russia. “If there was a general negotiation, a true negotiation over the terms of a cease fire and terms to protect the sovereignty and statehood of Ukraine,” Burns said, “I wouldn't trust the Chinese at all to be at that table.”