Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will lobby British Prime Minister Boris Johnson in person to ban Huawei and other Chinese telecommunications giants from the United Kingdom’s next generation of wireless technology.
“There is no safe option for untrusted vendors to control any part of a 5G network,” a State Department spokeswoman told the Washington Examiner. “We look forward to working with the U.K. on a way forward that results in the exclusion of untrusted vendor components from 5G networks.”
Johnson’s refusal to ban Huawei from British networks left China hawks in Washington gloomy and provoked criticism from members of his own party who share American suspicions of the Beijing-backed company. That decision was unveiled on the eve of Pompeo’s arrival in London, as the new prime minister reportedly overruled his own defense secretary and flouted the Trump administration’s dire warnings about Huawei.
“Our view of Huawei is: Putting it in your system creates real risk,” Pompeo told reporters during his flight to London, adding that there is “a chance for the United Kingdom to relook at this as implementation moves forward.”
Pompeo had planned the trip as an opportunity to “reaffirm the special relationship” with the U.K. and discuss trade issues, according to a State Department bulletin. Instead, American cybersecurity hawks hope that Johnson will face a revolt in Parliament over the decision.
“While it’s unlikely that they’re going to reverse this, it’s not a complete done deal,” Klon Kitchen, a cyber expert at the Heritage Foundation, told the Washington Examiner.
Johnson’s team maintained that they could strike a balance between national security and “the interests of our economy,” despite American warnings to the contrary.
“The [National Cyber Security Centre] has helped operators manage the use of vendors that pose a greater national security risk, such as Huawei and ZTE, for many years,” British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told the House of Commons on Wednesday. “Risk cannot be eliminated in telecoms. But it is the job of government, Ofcom, and industry to work together to ensure we reduce our vulnerabilities and mitigate those risks.”
That statement amounts to a gamble that British cybersecurity officials can monitor what Pompeo’s team has estimated to be “many millions of lines of code” that could be exploited by Chinese spy agencies. “The U.K. is fundamentally overestimating their ability to mitigate this threat,” Kitchen said. “It’s a cosmic bet.”
