In Houston, the Chinese have a problem. Washington announced, Wednesday, July 22, the closure of the Chinese consulate in the Texas city within seventy-two hours. This decision is unprecedented since the two countries began to maintain diplomatic relations in 1979. It comes against a backdrop of escalating tensions between the two superpowers, engaged in a battle for commercial, diplomatic, technological and even supremacy. spatial.
Officially, the closure of the consulate was motivated by the fight against "massive and illegal operations of espionage and Chinese influence [on American soil, editor's note]", specified the State Department [the American equivalent of Ministry of Foreign Affairs]. The day before, the United States had revealed the indictment of two Chinese nationals they accuse of being hackers having stolen information from several American groups and entities, including research laboratories working to develop treatments against the Covid -19 for the benefit of the Chinese government.
A consulate in the sights of the FBI
The Chinese delegation in Houston would thus be considered a nest of spies. More than the other four, which are in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York or Chicago? Marco Rubio, the Republican senator from Florida, is convinced of this. "The Chinese consulate in Houston is not a diplomatic building. It is the heart of the vast network of spies established in the United States by the Chinese Communist Party", he said on Twitter ... Without giving more than details.
# China's consulate in #Houston is not a diplomatic facility. It is the central node of the Communist Party's vast network of spies & influence operations in the United States. Now that building must close & the spies have 72 hours to leave or face arrest.
This needed to happen.
David Stilwell, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific, took it upon himself to go into more detail. This American official accuses the Chinese People's Army "of sending Chinese students, officially or not, to American universities to take courses that will allow Beijing to push their military advantage in the world. And the consulate in Houston is there. 'epicenter of all these activities,' reports the Hong Kong daily South China Morning Post.
He told The New York Times that Chinese Consul General Cai Wei was checked at Houston airport with false identity papers at the end of May, escorting Chinese nationals to take charter flights. (i.e. non-scheduled flights) to China.
The FBI is also interested in the Houston consulate as part of several investigations, learned the New York Times. Chinese diplomats are believed to have sought to illegally send research documents obtained from laboratories in the region to China, and to have pressured Chinese nationals in the United States that Beijing wanted to return to the country.
Pressure from Chinese diplomats
More generally, the location of Houston can be considered strategic. The city is home to one of NASA's largest space centers, and is located in the heart of the US oil region.
"Several incidents involving US energy companies in connection with the consulate have been noted in the past," Bill Hayton, an expert on energy issues in Asia at Chatham House, a London-based think tank, said on Twitter. . Contacted by e-mail, this researcher specified "that between 2006 and 2009, the consulate had put pressure on American oil companies active in the region of the South China Sea, of which Hunt Oil and Pogo". For him, one of the missions of the Chinese diplomats in Texas would be "to monitor the projects which could interest Beijing of the American companies of the energy sector".
So many actions that can be considered hostile, but do not constitute overwhelming evidence of the role of the Houston consulate as the nerve center of intelligence "made in China". So, admittedly, by definition, the secrecy surrounding espionage implies that the full picture of what Chinese diplomats are suspected will likely never be revealed. But "this consulate does not, to my knowledge, have a reputation for being a particularly important spy nest," said Danny Russell, who dealt with Southeast Asia issues and Pacific at the State Department until 2017.
Above all, if the objective is really to limit the theft of technology, "the United States would have done much better to close the Chinese consulate in San Francisco which is responsible for everything related to Silicon Valley", believes Jeff Moon, a former US trade representative with China, interviewed by CNN.
Satisfy the Republican electoral base
For him, this decision by Donald Trump has more to do with domestic politics than with espionage. It is no coincidence that the Houston consulate is the only one in a state controlled by the Republicans and where Donald Trump still has a slight advantage in the polls over his Democratic opponent, Joe Biden. It is a way for the president to satisfy and to mobilize his electorate "which is still in demand of sanctions against China", estimates the Vox site.
This closure of the consulate is also the best way to make the maximum political noise while taking the minimum diplomatic risk. The system of diplomatic relations between China and the United States means that each delegation in one country has its equivalent in the other. The "brother" consulate of that of Houston is located ... in Wuhan. It has not reopened since the start of the pandemic, and if Beijing decided to close it, in an eye for an eye logic, consulate for consulate, "that would not pose a particular logistical or diplomatic problem for Washington", underlines CNN.
Beijing would still have to play the game. For the time being, the Chinese authorities are furious and it seems that they are instead considering closing the American consulate in Chengdu, believes the South China Morning Post. It would be a much harder diplomatic blow for Washington, as this delegation deals with all matters relating to Tibet. By wanting to please his base, Donald Trump would have deprived the country of a valuable source of information on one of the most politically sensitive regions in Asia.
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